Consultancy Service for "Scoping Study and Value Chain Analysis - ENRICH project"

TERMS OF REFERENCE
Scoping Study and Value Chain Analysis for identification of potential Value Chains compatible with forest landscape restoration in Ha Tinh province.

Country:                          Vietnam
Organisation:                  SNV – Netherlands Development Organisation
Project:                           Advancing Understanding of Natural Forest Carbon Stock Enhancement as part of REDD+ (ENRICH Project)
Duration:                         Indicative 20 days - from September to October 2017

1     Background to the assignment

SNV has been working in Vietnam since 1995. Using market based approaches, SNV is committed to reducing poverty by catalysing environmentally sustainable solutions for the poor in agriculture, energy, water & sanitation, and Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+). SNV is implementing the project ‘Advancing Understanding of Forest Carbon Stock Enhancement at Landscape level as part of REDD+”, (ENRICH II) 2015-2018. This project is comprises for key components: (i) introducing pilot demonstration activities on forest carbon stock capacity enhancement to representative forest ecosystems; (ii) providing recommendations to the National REDD+ program on proper incentive structures for forest carbon stock enhancement; (iii) supporting the inclusion of forest carbon stock enhancement as part of National REDD+ Program; and (iv) support Ha Tinh and Nghe An provinces to develop forest landscape restoration (FLR) plans.

Although Vietnam’s forest cover continues to increase, the quality continues to deteriorate and planted forests are becoming increasingly dominant compared to natural forests. There are several reasons behind why natural forests are at risk and their sustainable management is not encouraged. These include:

• Sectors with higher economic value are expanding at the sake of natural forest, supported by national and provincial economic plans.
• The depleted nature of the natural forests reduces their current and future value, traditionally determined by their timber-producing capacity.
• Weaknesses in land use planning processes, law enforcement, financial and technical support, and information availability are facilitating the loss of forest.
• Local people have unclear or non-existent rights to land and trees, disincentivizing them from manage forests sustainably.
• Continued poverty and demand for agricultural land in forest-frontier areas makes encroachment difficult to address at the local level.

This context means that it is not sufficient to simply strengthen the protection of natural forests in order to conserve them. Instead, their survival depends on restoring them to be more productive in a range of social, environmental and economic outcomes, contributing, among other things, to local employment and income generation, supporting biodiversity, and locally and globally important ecosystem functions including reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

SNV’s ENRICH project has demonstrated the potential of certain forest management techniques to deliver restoration and carbon enhancement in natural forests. Preliminary results show >25% increase in annual growth rates of poor and medium evergreen forests as a result of these activities, equivalent to 2.2 tCO2ha-1yr-1. Biodiversity assessments later in 2017 will measure the effect on restoring a natural ecosystem. The project has so far demonstrated that forest restoration can be successfully delivered in a cost effective way.

However, despite international agreements on the need to reduce carbon emissions and provide support to developing countries to do so, funding for these actions has not yet emerged on the scale that was expected a few years ago. Vietnam’s current system of forest classifications, owners and domestic budget allocations cannot, and should not be expected to, fill this gap alone, especially under the current management models and policy constraints.

In response to this situation, both the revised NRAP and ER-PD recognise the need to develop new viable management models for natural forests, especially degraded natural forests, in order to ensure their protection and, ideally, restoration. The PRAP calls to “pilot, evaluate and replicate sustainable models for natural forests enhancement, protection and conservation.” This will be delivered through two complementary measures: “replicating models to manage, protect and rehabilitate natural forest” and “developing new business models that contribute to forest protection and forest conservation”. In short, there is a need to engage business, communities and farmers in developing economic activities that are compatible with and even contribute to the restoration of natural forest ecosystems, and to identify what support can be provided to enable these markets to flourish.

SNV’s ENRICH project is working in two North Central Coast provinces, Ha Tinh and Nghe An – two provinces that under the ER-PD have committed to revising their PRAP in line with the newly approved revised NRAP. This assignment is concerned with identifying value chains that can support natural forest restoration in these provinces and understanding the scale of the contributions they could make towards increasing investment into forests. It will require engaging stakeholders to determine how these value chains can best be supported, and providing targeted recommendations and inputs that are relevant to policy makers, donors, and development agencies at national and provincial level on the next steps in developing markets.

2     Assignment objectives and outcomes

The objective of this work is to contribute to developing new business models for restoration of natural forests. These will be business models that do not rely on carbon markets, Vietnam’s PFES or the Vietnamese domestic budget – it is assumed for now that these funding sources are too limited and unable to contribute adequately to the regeneration of natural forests. This will be done by analysing value chains that are compatible with natural forest conservation and restoration, identifying a selection that have most potential to bring revenue and investment into the local economy, and assessing the policy and institutional frameworks needed to develop these markets.

Specific objectives:

• Identify a long list of relevant value chains that are compatible with the conservation, management or restoration/rehabilitation of natural forests in Ha Tinh province. These will be value chains that either require the protection of existing natural forest or require investment in the natural forest (in terms or labour, forest management, re-planting in certain regimes with native species).
• Describe value chains - for a subset/shortlist of the most promising value chains, to be decided based on potential value generated among other factors, determine relevant details such as actor mapping, value flows etc.
• Analyse the key constraints that influence the development of the value chain development.
• Based on these above analysis, recommend an action plan for sustainable development of the selected value chains.

This assignment is only a preliminary assessment that is meant to inform the future research and demonstration projects by different stakeholders. It is not meant to definitive, but instead should provide an evidence-based recommendation for further policy and programme development in certain vale chains. The assignment will answer the questions – what are the next feasible steps in developing these value chains? As a result, the outcomes of this assignment will be:

1. Improved understanding at national and provincial levels of some high-potential value chains that should be taken forwards for further study and piloting.
2. Improved understanding of the type of policy and institutional changes that might be required to enable these value chairs, and the magnitude of contribution these value chains can make to natural forest restoration and pro-poor economic development.
3. National-level policy makers, donors, development agencies will have a clearer understanding of the opportunities and constraints for delivering on Financing options that incentivise Forest Landscape Restoration at the local level.

SNV will use this information for: input into a report on lessons learned from ENRICH for global audiences; discussion with Ha Tinh authorities and inputs into their PRAP revisions and Forest Landscape Restoration plans; sharing with other development actors and institutions as necessary.

3     Scope of the assignment

The assignment should take place in the following parameters:

• Geography: SNV’s ENRICH project has been working in Ha Tinh province.
• The value chains need to be compatible with natural forest conservation and restoration. A value chain that is compatible with natural forest restoration is one that will either require the protection of existing natural forest in order to safeguard the provision of the goods or services, or one that will require investment in the natural forest (in terms or labour, forest management, re-planting in certain regimes with native species).
• The value chains assessed should include those consistent with existing forest land use types (SUF, protection and production) but should not be limited to only what is currently possible – the inclusion of value chains that would require some policy change to is valid as long as they are consistent with the protection and conservation and natural forest.

The value chains should not include: carbon certificates or any business model that relies on the forests as a carbon sink; any business model that relies on domestic public resources, for example existing levels of PFES or forest protection payments. The value chains will be judged in their ability to encourage investment into the forests from private actors.

4     Requirements

Key activities:

The main activities will be data collection, analysis of this data, and synthesising this into a report for SNV.

• Data collection: desk-based study and field trip(s).
  
  • Synthesize and establish initial knowledge base on the sector’s settings, and to design specific information needs as well as tools for data collection, if required, for the field trips.
  • Collecting primary data in the field Ha Tinh through interviews with a wide variety of stakeholders. The process of interviewing stakeholders will also contribute to the building of relationships between the project team, PPC and the stakeholders.

• Analysis and report writing: this will involve two-way communication between the consultant, the SNV project team and other relevant stakeholders to validate and share findings. The analysis of data is the full responsibility of the consultant selected, but it will be a participatory process in which key stakeholders must be consulted.
• Excellent coordination and working relationship with SNV project team (see below).

Inception report

A inception report will include:

1. A long list of value chains based on desk-research and recommendation of which to pursue in more detail.
2. Proposal for field trip research, interviews and primary research.

Field trip

Trip to Ha Tinh in order to conduct interviews and collect primary data.

Final report

A final report (in both Vietnamese and English) is to be submitted, addressing all the three research objectives as pointed out in the above. The report template is suggested to be composed of the sections with structure as below:

1. Executive summary
2. Introductions/Backgrounds of the assignment
3. Research methodology
4. Current status of the value chain in provinces
5. Analysis
6. Conclusions
7. Recommendations

Coordination with SNV project team

The SNV project team will provide support to the consultant, provide feedback where needed, and approve steps in the project as it progresses. It might also be important to consult with local stakeholders on various stages of the assignment in order to ensure it is meeting their needs as it progresses.

Time frame

This work should take place within a period not exceeding 20 working days, expected to commence within September and October and to have a final report completed and approved by SNV by the end of October 2017.

Qualifications

The consultant(s) should meet the following requirements:

• Holding Master Degree either in Economics or Business Administration or related field;
• Having good understanding of value chain development approach;
• Being fluent in research methodologies (qualitative and quantitative methods);
• Being able to deliver the committed outputs on time;
• Having excellent analytical skills and report writing skill in English;
• Having experience in agricultural or forestry sub-sector analysis and market study is an asset;
• Having good understanding of Vietnamese forestry policy is an asset;
• Having contacts and networks in relevant sectors and locations is an asset.

Application

Interested consultant(s) send application letters and CVs, together with technical proposal and an indication of expected fee rate, to [email protected] by 30th August 2017 with the title: “Scoping Study and Value Chain Analysis - ENRICH project"