Background

The UNDP Strategic Plan 2018-2021 embraces the complexity of development and commits the organization to helping countries find faster, more durable solutions to achieve Agenda 2030.? In line with this, the organization has begun incubating?a number of?strategic initiatives aimed at ensuring UNDP is ‘fit for purpose’ to deliver a new generation of solutions in line with the challenges the world faces.??

One such key strategic initiative is the Accelerator Lab Network.? The initiative is a recognition that increasingly interrelated development challenges require going beyond business as usual and single point, linear and silver bullet responses in development.? Instead, they call for interdisciplinary approaches and non-linear solutions that crowd in the collective efforts of a wide variety of partners and tap into local insights and contextual, sticky knowledge of citizens.?? The initiative is also a recognition and an investment in the emerging momentum among a growing number of UNDP Country Offices for marrying disruptive, cutting edge methodologies with contextual, country-based insights and expertise to accelerate learning, progress and impact toward the SDGs.?

With this in mind, the?UNDP intends to build the largest and fastest learning global network of Accelerator Labs (initially setting up 60 labs in 82 countries) embedded within UNDP’s global architecture and country platforms that embody the new organizational offering to transform the collective approach to development.?

The network will surface and reinforce locally sourced solutions at scale while mobilizing a wide and dynamic partnership of actors contributing knowledge, resources and experience.? The initiative is meant to transform our collective approach by introducing new protocols, backed by evidence and practice, which accelerate the testing and dissemination of solutions within and across countries. This will enable the global community to collectively learn from local knowledge and ingenuity at a speed and at a scale that our societies and planet require. This will be achieved by:??

• ?Building on locally-sourced solutions, finding things that work and expanding on them;?
• ?Rapid testing and iteration to implement what works and go beyond the obvious solutions;?
• Combining the best understanding, ideas and expertise to generate collective knowledge;?
• Accelerating progress by bringing expertise, creativity and collective intelligence to bear.?

SUDAN

UNDP in Sudan has consistently promoted innovative initiatives since 2014 as an enabler to doing development efficiently and tackle barriers to development pathways. In partnership with the government, private sector, incubators and civil society organizations, Country Office (CO) has undertaken initiatives that applied design thinking, human centered approach, to create solutions on better citizen engagement towards building peace and social cohesion; behavioral insights to understand pathways of radicalization and determine programme response to prevent violent extremism, telecom big data to measure proxy multi- dimensional poverty, crowd sourcing through radios to obtain perceptions on public service delivery, as well as promotion and capacity building of youth on social innovation. These initiatives were conducted within ongoing projects or as test pilots facilitated by the CO Innovation Task Force.

Sudan is one of the selected country offices amongst 60 countries for the launch of UNDP’s global network of Accelerator Lab in 2019, embedded within UNDP’s global architecture and country platforms. The establishment of the lab will support CO’s objectives and ongoing efforts in applying up to date social and policy innovation concepts, tools and approaches to address most complex and emerging development challenges in the country. Social and policy innovation for UNDP Sudan means

pursuing new approaches, ideas and solutions combining multiple disciplines, types of actors and sectors, to put effective capacity and processes at the core of public service delivery and social progress right from initial nudge through scale and systemic change.

In particular, Sudan CO envisions the Accelerator Lab to build on the latest thinking from the fields of complexity science, lead user innovation, collective intelligence and data innovation to co-create solutions and accelerate development impact through improved, efficient and inclusive responses in support of UNDP’s current and upcoming priorities on local governance, economic stabilization and sustainable livelihoods amongst others.

Sudan Horizon Scanner 

To be able to facilitate and affect change during the transitional period in Sudan, large-scale horizon scanning system is key. Because it serves the following purposes of exploration:

• Generate continues stream of baseline data.
• To identify and make sense of emerging issues.
• Asses impact on interventions concerning the priorities of the transitional period.
• Identify new sources of evidence and insights.
• Provide data for modeling and simulation for better decision making and resource mobilization.
• Contribute to the formulation of the Accelerator Lab service lines to the UNDP Country Programme based on findings from

Duties and Responsibilities

• Set the exploration and visual anthropology framework for Sudan Horizon Scanner.

The head of exploration and the research assistant led by the visual anthropologist will set the guild lines and ethical frame work of the exploration function of the Accelerator Lab Sudan as well as the visual anthology protocol for the Sudan Horizon Scanner in the form of practice manual. The visual anthropologist will also create the human rights framework of the exploration function of the lab which will also be included in the Manuel.

• Help in choosing and training the team on the appropriate tools and approaches.

The visual anthropologist will train the Accelerator Lab’s team on the appropriate tools of image and video analysis that will inform the data being conducted by Sudan Horizon Scanner.

• Support the initial testing activities

The visual anthropologist will support and validate the data collection, the findings, and analysis of the social anthropologist regarding the usage of the tools and approaches trained in.

• Shortlisted candidates will be contacted for an interview in early December

Institutional Arrangement

The Visual Anthropologist will work under the direct supervision of the Accelerator Lab Sudan’s Head of Exploration and in close liaison with UNDP Sudan staff. The payment arrangement for this post included the DSA and travel cost for the consultant to come to Khartoum to deliver the workshop.

Duration of the WorK

The total duration of this activity is from 28th November 2019 until 30th November 2020. The total numbers of working days required are 145 working days.

Duty Station

The Contractor is expected to work from where they are based for most of the time and be in Khartoum to deliver training for the chosen cohort of visual anthropologist to curry on with the activities of

Criteria for longlisting

• International candidate
• Minimum Master’s degree

The IC modality is expected to be used only for short-term consultancy engagements.  If the duration of the IC for the same TOR exceeds twelve (12) months, the duration must be justified and be subjected to the approval of the Director of the Regional Bureau, or a different contract modality must be considered.  This policy applies regardless of the delegated procurement authority of the Head of the Business Unit. 

Evaluation Criteria and selection of the consultant

The offers received from the candidates will be evaluated using combined scoring method. The combined scoring method assesses the offers with technical merits of the proposals – where the qualifications and methodology will be weighted a maximum of 70%, and later combined with the price offer which will be weighted a max of 30%. Only offers received minimum 70% of technical weightage (49 points) will be invited to submit the financial offer.

Competencies

• Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
• Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
• Treats all people fairly without favoritism;
• Ability to work with a multi-cultural and diverse team.

Required Skills and Experience

• Refined understanding of culture and society.
• A master’s degree in visual anthropology, human rights, social anthropology or related fields.
• Minimum of 2 years of work experience in anthropological field work, training, research or curriculum design.
• Ability to liaise and communicate with a range of national and international partners;
• Excellent spoken and written communication skills.
• Being comfortable around ambiguity and have a grasp on topics entertaining complexity science and system thinking.

For full details regarding the TOR and Offerors Letter please see the below links:-

https://www.dropbox.com/s/d3dwwe66c8kaeib/Offerors%20Letter%20-Visual%20Anthropologist.docx?dl=0

https://www.dropbox.com/s/iukfexvfnkmu5qw/ToR%20Visual%20Anthropologist.pdf?dl=0