Consultancy –– Request for Proposals
“Expanding African Women’s Economic Futures: Individual Dreams, Collective Actions” Project Baseline

1. Introduction
Urgent Action Fund-Africa (UAF-Africa) is a pan-African, activist and feminist Fund, established in 2001 in Nairobi, Kenya. Using a rapid response grant making (RRG) model, UAF-Africa supports unanticipated, time sensitive, innovative, and bold initiatives. These enable African feminists and women’s rights organisations to seize windows of opportunity, fracture patriarchy, amplify their voices, enhance their visibility and become significant actors who can influence policy and law while shaping discourse. Such opportunities arise when an unexpected event either positive or negative creates a situation in which rapid intervention can have a significant impact. This way, UAF-Africa fills a unique grant making niche within the African feminist movement, providing stepping stones to activists as they use their agency and resilience to achieve social, economic, political and environmental justice.
UAF-Africa will be carrying out a 3-year project entitled, “Expanding African Women’s Economic Futures: Individual Dreams, Collective Actions!” to enhance women’s economic empowerment (WEE) as it relates specifically to Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The strategies to be implemented by UAF-Africa are: 1. Provision of rapid response, advocacy and alliance building and emerging grants, 2. Capacity strengthening, strategic communications and media engagement, 3. Engaging female leaders and champions, 4. Supporting cooperation and collaboration amongst women and with other stakeholders, and 5. Supporting institutional, sub-national and national advocacy.

2. Purpose, objectives and principles

2.1 Purpose
The purpose of this consultancy is to build the necessary baseline which is part of the agreement between UAF-Africa and the Gates foundation and needs to be finalised before May, 2019. The baseline will assess the current advocacy capacities of women’s rights organizations, including skills and infrastructure to advocate for and achieve economic empowerment and provide a comprehensive assessment of the context and actors. The baseline will also make recommendations to improve existing indicators (if deemed necessary), and it will enable UAF-Africa to put in place effective mechanisms to gather relevant data to monitor and steer the programme.

2.2. Objectives
The objectives for this consultancy are that the Consultants will:
Establish a baseline that gathers relevant data to enable UAF-Africa to monitor, evaluate and adjust the programme as necessary;
Make recommendations pertaining to the relevance of our existing indicators;
Make recommendations to consider in moving forward to ensure that shifts in context and impact are captured, as well as programmatic recommendations.

The baseline needs to allow UAF-Africa to compare progress throughout the programme taken the starting point 2019. Please note that the following information should be included in the baseline:

• An assessment of the current advocacy capacities of partners;
• Country, regional and/or global context analyses in relation to key issues pertaining to economic empowerment will be described along with a mapping of the relevant actors and stakeholders, and a list of relevant laws and policies.

2.3. Principles

The following guiding principles and parameters apply during the research process:
Participatory methods are part of the approach;
UAF-Africa Staff and (key) partner organisations will actively participate in this process.

3. Methodology
As the study should be the result of participation and collective contribution by relevant stakeholders, the Consultant shall define the methodology together with UAF-Africa. The methodology should, however, be participatory and a mix of quantitative and qualitative data collection methods.

4. Timeline

30 April	Request for Proposal disseminated
13 May	Deadline for submission of proposals
14 -24 May	Candidates shortlisted and interviewed
27 May	Consultant selected and contract developed and signed
3 – 7 June	Data collection by consultants
12 June	Submit first draft of the report to UAF-Africa
14 June	Feedback shared with consultant
18 June	Final report submitted to UAF-Africa
Optional	Development of infographics or other communications materials to illustrate the results and can be used for advocacy purposes

5. Qualifications/specialised knowledge/experience required to complete the task

• Track record related to monitoring and evaluation/conducting evaluations on similar programmes;
• Excellent academic and research background;
• Excellent conceptual and analytical skills for quantitative and qualitative data analysis;
• Previous work experience with the Gates Foundation, especially in conducting baseline and/or other evaluation studies;
• Knowledge of women’s human rights, social justice and international development;
• Experience of working in the focus countries (Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda).

6. Application
Interested Consultants are requested to send the following:

• A two-page overview setting out the intended methodological approach and planning to conduct this assignment;
• Two examples of performed evaluations (especially if conducted for projects supported by the Gates Foundation)– maximum of a 10-page summary report;
• Resumes of involved Consultants that clearly presents the experience in conducting baseline studies;
• Detailed budget with breakdown of fee, number of days per activity proposed and other costs.

Interviews with selected Consultants will take place in the week of 13th May 2019.

Applications should be sent to jobs@UAF-Africa.org by email: by 10th May 2019.