Environmental and Social Safeguards Consultant Nature-based Solutions for Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation in the Rice Sector

Call for Expression of Interest (EOI)

ENVIRONMENTAL AND SOCIAL SAFEGUARDS CONSULTANT
NATURE-BASED SOLUTIONS FOR CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION AND MITIGATION IN THE RICE SECTOR

BACKGROUND

SNV Netherlands Development Organisation

SNV is a not-for-profit international development organisation driven by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Founded in the Netherlands in 1965, we have built a long-term country presence in over 24 countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Our global team of local and international advisors works with local partners to equip communities, businesses, and organizations with the tools, knowledge, and connections they need to increase their incomes and gain access to markets and basic services - empowering them to break the cycle of poverty and guide their own development. Our work focuses on three sectors - Agriculture, Energy, and Water, Sanitation, & Hygiene (WASH).

SNV has been working in Viet Nam since 1995, and currently has over 30 national and international staff. SNV Viet Nam’s team works hand-in-hand with communities, government agencies, and businesses in more than 50 provinces, including the remotest and poorest areas of the country. We operate from a country head office in Hanoi and regional offices in Ho Chi Minh City and Dalat.

Assignment Description

Rice production is central to Vietnamese culture, food security, poverty reduction and socio-economic development. Over the last 30 years, Viet Nam has made tremendous gains in increasing productivity to address food insecurity - average rice yields now trail only China, and it is now among the most food-available Middle-Income Countries (MIC) globally^[1]. As the country has opened up to investment, trade and export markets, the country has become the second-largest global producer and exporter of rice. However, Vietnamese agriculture and the rice sector in particular, stand at a crossroads.

Viet Nam is recognised as one of the countries most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change due to the large number of people living in low-lying coastal and delta regions, many of whom are directly dependent on land and agriculture as a primary livelihood strategy and source of income. Viet Nam’s Mekong River Delta (MRD) is one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable landscapes, already and expected to be increasingly impacted by water shortages, droughts, rising sea levels and saline intrusion. Yet it is also Viet Nam’s, and one of the world’s most important rice baskets – where 90% of Viet Nam’s rice for export is grown. There is an urgent need for a widescale transition to climate resilient rice production in the MRD.

At the same time, Viet Nam is rapidly developing and on the way to becoming a Middle Income Country. As such, the country is expected to, and has made, ambitious climate mitigation commitments. Agriculture is now the third largest sector contributing to climate change with around half of GHG emissions resulting from rice production. Therefore, reducing GHG emissions from rice production is a key priority for the agriculture sector.

Viet Nam’s rice production is characterised by intensive production by millions of SHFs with high yields for low value export markets. Very thin margins have meant that many rice farmers remain perilously positioned at just above the poverty line and vulnerable to commodity price shocks in global markets. The Covid-19 pandemic has severely impacted agricultural supply chains and demonstrated the vulnerability of SHFs to such global shocks. As Viet Nam rapidly develops to become a MIC, the costs of land and living rise, as do inequalities. Farmers need to increase their profit margins to remain above the poverty line. There is a need for the rice sector to shift to higher value markets.

For all the above reasons the Vietnamese rice sector urgently need to transition towards low carbon, sustainable and climate-resilient production practices. With these objectives in mind, and with support from the Australian Department for Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), SNV is in the process of preparing a new project which aims to transform rice value chains through engaging the private sector targeting the upper MRD provinces of An Giang, Dong Thap and Kien Giang. The project aims to build on lessons learned from the recently completed AgResults Viet Nam Emission Reduction Challenge Project (AVERP) implemented by SNV in the Red River Delta, and which piloted an innovative prize competition to stimulate private sector investment and scaling of low carbon rice technologies. The new project seeks to adapt approaches to achieve widespread adoption and scaling of similar technologies in the MRD.

In order to prepare the new DFAT-funded rice value chain transformation project, SNV therefore seeks the services of a national (Vietnamese) Environmental and Social Safeguard Consultant to conduct of an associated environmental and social assessment and elaboration of an Environmental and Social Management Framework (ESMF).

KEY TASKS & RESPONSIBILITIES

The Consultant will be reporting to the Agriculture Sector Leader and the Project Team Leader. S/he is expected to perform the following key tasks and responsibilities:

• As a contribution to the project preparation phase background assessments, prepare environmental and social profiles of the project’s target landscape in the upper MRD provinces of An Giang, Dong Thap and Kien Giang.
• Conduct a preliminary screening of project work packages and activities against SNV (aligned to IFC Performance Standards) and DFAT’s environmental and social safeguards policies and standards and identify relevant environmental and social issues of concern, including risks.
• Conduct assessment of potential environmental and social co-benefits and risks associated with the project’s proposed activities.
• Prepare an environmental and social assessment report detailing potential impacts identified as well as project strategies and measures to maximise environmental and social co-benefits and key environmental/social risks to be avoided, managed, and mitigated.
• Based on the co-benefit enhancement and risk mitigation strategies and measures identified (see (vi) above), draft an Environmental and Social Management Framework (ESMF) for the project (including safeguards M&E indicators, methods, capacity building needs and budget).
• Prepare materials for presentation of and consultation on environmental and social co-benefits, risks and the ESMF as part of the Cross-cutting element section of SNV’s proposal.
• Finalise the ESMF based on comments and feedback from the national consultation workshop.
• Contribute to the preparation of the project proposal document’s relevant sections on environmental and social safeguards sections.

For more details on the Expression of Interest process, submission requirements, and evaluation details, please see corresponding sections below:

Selection Process

SNV will review all Expressions of Interest received in accordance with the guidelines and criteria in this solicitation. SNV reserves the right to exclude any EOIs that do not meet the guidelines. Please note that SNV is unable to provide detailed feedback to those EOIs that are not selected.

Step 1: SNV will shortlist selected EOIs, and unsuccessful respondents will be notified. Successful applicants will be contacted by SNV.
Step 2: SNV will release Requests for Proposals (RFPs) for the specific activities and contract with the selected organizations/ consultants.

Protection of Information

We request that Expressions of Interest responses be free of any intellectual property that the applicant wishes to protect. Should offerors wish to include proprietary intellectual property that they believe would be helpful for SNV, please note the proprietary nature of such information. Costing information will be kept confidential and will not be shared beyond SNV.

Issuance of this EOI does not constitute a commitment, award, or engagement on the part of SNV nor does it commit SNV to any future commitment or engagement.

Note: SNV reserves the right to change or cancel this requirement in the EOI/or solicitation process at any time.

_________

[1]World Bank (2016).