1. General Background of LIFT
The Livelihoods and Food Security Trust Fund (LIFT) is a multi-donor fund established in 2010 to address food insecurity and income poverty in Myanmar. LIFT has received funding from 14 donors – the United Kingdom, the European Union, Australia, Switzerland, Denmark, the United States, the Netherlands, Sweden, France, Luxembourg, Italy, New Zealand, Ireland and Mitsubishi Corporation. The United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) is the Fund Manager to administer the funds and provide monitoring and oversight.
The overall goal of LIFT is to sustainably reduce the number of people living in poverty and hunger in Myanmar. LIFT’s purpose is to improve the incomes and nutrition status of poor people in Myanmar by promoting resilient livelihoods and food security. LIFT’s designated outcomes are improvements in income, resilience, nutrition, and pro-poor policy developments.
LIFT works with implementing partners that include international and national non-government organisations, United Nations agencies, the Government of Myanmar, private sector organisations, academic and research institutions.
LIFT is active in the four main agro-ecological zones of Myanmar: the Ayeyarwady Delta, the Rakhine State, the central dry zone (including Mandalay, Magway and the southern Sagaing region), and the upland areas of Chin, Kachin, Kayah, Kayin and Shan States and Tanintharyi Region.
So far, LIFT has reached more than 7.2 million people, or roughly 20 per cent of Myanmar’s population; and is active in almost half the country’s townships. LIFT is funding projects through to June 2019. For more details, visit www.lift-fund.org.
2. Background to the TOR
Since its inception, LIFT has worked with Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) both as directly contracted implementing partners and as sub-implementing partners through INGOs and United Nations organisations. In 2016, 39% of LIFT’s grant funding was directly managed by local entities, which includes both CSO and private sector organisations.
Therefore, the number of local CSOs supported by LIFT is relatively low compared to international organisations. LIFT initiated small grant and strategic partnership programs in order to strengthen the local capacity to promote food and livelihood security of the poor. LIFT needs to give necessary technical support for these initiatives and the consultancy will contribute to this as requested by the FMO staff.
3. Specific Objectives of the Assignment
In order to follow up the effectiveness/ impact/ results of the efforts to support the CSO, LIFT plans to undertake two studies, one in 2017 and one in 2018. The consultant will be responsible to lead on the studies and to provide additional technical support as requested by LIFT’s Civil Society Partnerships Officer (CSPO) under the direct supervision of LIFT Program Coordinator.
3.1: Study 1 (start in October 2017): Indirect costs
The first study will focus on the use of indirect costs by the partner organization. CSOs have consistently stated that their major capacity challenge is in attracting unrestricted funds. The claiming of indirect costs is a key component of the unrestricted funding of international agencies. While some donors allow for Indirect Cost Recovery (ICR), these costs are generally retained in full by the contracted partner (usually international) to the exclusion of sub-contracted implementers (local).
In 2015, LIFT revised its Operational Guidelines to read “In partnerships and consortiums, the 6% indirect costs should normally be shared among implementing partner organizations, including local civil society organizations, proportionate to their implementation budget (6% of their total budget)."
In 2016-17, three small-grants funds were launched with LIFT support. For the first time in Myanmar, a sufficiently large sample of CSOs would be receiving their share of indirect costs. The opportunity arose to learn more about how CSOs allocate these funds and provide donor learning for their main-budget funding practice.
The first study will address three main questions
- Where do CSOs allocate indirect costs (and unrestricted funds more generally)? Do CSOs have (feel a need for) an unrestricted funds policy?
- What processes do they use to make these allocation decisions?Do these allocation processes have an added value in strengthening CSO governance, decision-making, accountability and financial planning?
- Are there potential co-relationships between allocation decisions, processes and CSO ‘strength’, ambitions, influence, and organisational capacity? Do particular decisions, and decision-making processes, co-relate with other assessments of CSO “strength”?
3.2: Study 2 (start in October 2017): Effectiveness of LIFT’s Civil Society Strengthening Efforts :
The second study will address following main questions (Plan to conduct in second quarter of 2018):
- What are the existing capacities of LIFT funded CSOs and how have they been changed/ improved/ strengthened through LIFT?
- What contributions has LIFT made regarding changes in their capacity? (Including their perception on LIFT's support) and what is the way forward for their further improvement of internal capacities (LIFT's roles, their roles, the roles of other stakeholders, etc.)
- What are factors from external actors and the context in which the CSOs operate? (Including roles of other strategic partners on the achievement of results)
3.3: Technical support to the CSOs
- Assist the Civil society partnerships officer in organizing inter-fund learning events among small grant fund facilitators, strategic partners and LIFT- funded local CSOs when relevant
- Design and organize civil society learning workshop with CSPO
- Give other technical assistance to small grant fund facilitators and Strategic partners whenever necessary and as requested by LIFT FMO.