Lebanon: Consultancy Service for LB2019-004 "Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Promotion Evaluation"

Purpose: Lebanese Red Cross (LRC) and Norwegian Red Cross (NorCross) seek to evaluate the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Promotion (WASH) projects funded by NorCross and implemented by LRC from 2015 until 2018, to identify lessons learned to improve and inform future projects and activities, and to determine if the implemented work had achieved the desired results reflected in the project package under the signed partnership agreements between both National Societies.

Audience: Lebanese Red Cross, Norwegian Red Cross, relevant Ministries in both countries, Participant National Societies, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and the Project beneficiaries.

Commissioners: This evaluation is being commissioned by Norwegian Red Cross in collaboration of Lebanese Red Cross

Reports to: The evaluator will directly report to NorCross Country Program Manager for Lebanon

Duration: Evaluation will be conducted within 8 weeks including briefings (including security), desk review, field visits, presenting initial findings, drafting report for comments and update final report.

Timeframe: Tentative dates will be within September and October 2019. Deadline to submit the report for revision is November 3rd, 2019.

Methodology summary: Evaluator will also conduct field visits to “Informal Tent Settlements” (ITS), facilitate focal group discussions with direct beneficiaries in selected ITS, semi-structured interviews and survey with volunteers/staff of LRC’s Disaster Management Unit (DMU) Centers and Headquarters.

Location: Evaluation will take place in NorCross Country Office in Beirut located in LRC Headquarters, and the desk study and field visits to DMU centers and ITS in relevant Governorates within Lebanon.

Background

Lebanon and Syria protracted crisis

The protracted crisis related to Syria conflict started in Lebanon in 2014 and created a state of emergency requiring immediate action but also looking for long-term needs that require interventions that are both lifesaving and that focus on more durable solutions in several sectors, including WASH. An estimated 3,3 million people (host communities and refugees) out of a total population of 5,9 million in Lebanon are poor or vulnerable and in need of assistance in health, water and sanitation.

Lebanese Red Cross

The Lebanese Red Cross (LRC) was founded on July 9, 1945 as an independent Red Cross Society. LRC plays a hugely important role as an auxiliary to its government and is the largest national humanitarian organisation in Lebanon, providing services to more than half a million people annually. LRC is recognised as the main provider of pre-hospital care in the country, with an ambulance service run by volunteers free of charge that benefits more than 245,000 persons annually. LRC is present in all major cities and population centres in Lebanon delivering services through a network of around 4,500 volunteers (40 % female, 60% male) and 265 staff working from 46 ambulance stations, 39 primary health centres, 9 mobile clinics, 12 blood banks, 34 youth centres and 12 disaster management units in addition to central headquarters in Beirut.

LRC is strong in operational services, has significant experience in conflict response and an experienced senior management. LRC’s ambulance service became the backbone and the identity of the organisation during the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990), establishing LRC as a neutral and impartial humanitarian organisation with a large network of volunteers, strong connections with local communities, good reputation and positive public image. This provides a unique access for LRC and the RCRC Movement partners throughout Lebanon. Due to the political situation that LRC is operating in, the role of the National Society (NS) as an auxiliary to a fragile government remains critical. Its access, acceptance and unifying role in a divided country makes LRC uniquely placed to reach communities and strengthen their resilience.

Due to an increase in humanitarian needs originating from the Syria crisis, LRC has expanded its services to include, among other sectors, a WASH program to respond to the needs of refugees. The program started implementing its first activities in Zahle branch in 2014. The successful pilot project expanded with the coordinated support of the RCRC movement partners to an ongoing WASH program in response to the continued Syria crisis in nine areas all over Lebanon: Hermel, Baalbek, Tripoli, Saida, Zahle, Akkar, Qabb Elias, Rachaya, and Hasbaya.

LRC WASH Program

The WASH program activities are divided into two main components, Soft WASH and Hard WASH, supported by three other components:

· Soft WASH: This technical term refers to all activities involving behaviour change, hygiene and sanitation promotion and awareness campaigns components of the WASH program. All activities, including water sampling and testing, trainings, PHAST[1] community approach, community exit strategy are be labelled as ‘Soft WASH’.

· Hard WASH: This technical term refers to all activities involving hardware components of the WASH program. All items including construction, rehabilitation and design of WASH infrastructures are labelled as ‘Hard WASH’. This category includes water storage facilities, rehabilitation of water systems and piped networks, protection of boreholes, rehabilitation, connection and set-up of sanitation systems and individual sanitation facilities.

· Environmental WASH: Two pilot projects are currently running as part of the WASH program which target Black Water Management (BWM) and solid waste management aiming to find new innovative approaches to tackle these two environmental concerns. The WASH Program started implementing a Pilot program on BWM mid 2016 to address the growing risks caused by waste water pollution in the environment (more specifically the water tables). This led the program to trial a bacterial inoculum as a processing phase of the human faeces (reduction of volume and pathogen content). In parallel to the BWM initiative, the WASH program also engaged in Soft WASH management (SWM) options to participate in the national solid waste strategy which resulted in the adoption of two main activities, a scoping and mapping study and the RANAS[2] approach.

· Distribution of Non-Food Items (NFIs): All the above components include the distribution of NFIs to pre-identified vulnerable groups, the selection of specific items identified and approved following an assessment, distribution methodology and delivering calendar. A robust monitoring of the item-use and measure of the reduction in vulnerability factors is conducted during the entire program duration to ensure pertinence of this activity. The types of items distributed include hygiene kits (pre-packaged or customized) and durable WASH items such as ceramic filters, solar lanterns, jerry cans, garbage bins, drainage kits, etc…

· Water quality testing: In collaboration with UNICEF, the LRC WASH Program conducted an institutional WASH and water quality survey to provide an integrated database involving several ministries, aimed to inform the WASH conditions in schools (MEHE[3]), Primary Health Care centres and nurseries (MoPH[4]), as well as in Social Development Centres (MOSA), UNRWA schools and Primary Health Centres (PHCs) servicing Lebanon’s most vulnerable people. A total of 2,386 institutions were surveyed in the period of May and June 2017.

The WASH program targeted locations regardless whether in an ITS, institutions or host communities. While the used tools differ between communities and many are tailored to the needs of the targeted community, the overall approach remains the same. The approach towards the community uses a behaviour change methodology named as PHAST, a tool developed by the WHO. The PHAST approach aims at helping people feel more confident about themselves and their ability to take action to make improvements in their communities. Feeling of empowerment and personal growth are as important as the physical changes, such as cleaning up the environment or building latrines. LRC WASH program has contextualised the PHAST tool to suit the targeted communities. This contextualized approach consists of seven steps and thirteen activities implemented with the community throughout the program. The first five steps help take the community group through a process of developing a plan to prevent WASH-related diseases by improving water supply, hygiene behaviour and sanitation. The sixth and seventh steps involve monitoring and evaluation on the actions taken.

Thus, the full WASH package implementation occurs in parallel with the PHAST implementation to achieve maximum impact of the project during a timeframe of between six and twelve months.

After supporting the communities, the WASH program will have to exit strategically these communities. As part of LRC’s overall strategy, the NS seeks to identify and assess needs and crisis situations in the country, respond to them accordingly and then as much and as quickly as possible exit the situation while providing adapted and sustainable structures and way-forward to re-deploy its resources and energy to other new arising crisis. It is now a central component of LRC implementation strategy to plan upstream and roll out comprehensive and adapted exit strategies which hinge on a strong community-based approach and the identification and creation of training and follow-up of various committees who will manage the infrastructures and skills delivered within the targeted communities. This process will increase the ownership of local communities that benefit from LRC’s activities and additional improvements made in the area. With the presence of Red Cross volunteers in all the targeted communities, the LRC WASH program relies on a robust presence in the field and aim to leverage the appropriate ownership and community organization to manage and monitor appropriately the implemented activities.

Norwegian Red Cross cooperation with LRC

NorCross is considered as one of LRC’s closest partners. NorCross’ added value lies clearly in its holistic support to LRC as well as being a long-term reliable and predictable partner, with access to diversified funding sources and resources for capacity building.

NorCross has been appointed by LRC to be the focal point and a key factor in developing its capacities for working on sustainable community solutions related to water and sanitation (WASH), hard-WASH, but particularly soft WASH in recent years. NorCross is providing technical expertise via its regional WASH delegate who brings added value by working closely with LRC teams, providing technical advice and quality assurance, and by supporting capacity building through day to day coaching in general management, programme management, and at the same time doing real time monitoring. This is in line with RCRC's added value in the wider humanitarian community where RCRC is a partner of choice to respond to health, WASH and other humanitarian needs emerging in the contexts of armed conflict and protracted crisis.

Previous LRC review for Swedish Red Cross funded projects

A review of the Swedish Red Cross funded WASH program (2013-2017) was conducted in November 2017. It is not a precedent or follow up of the Norwegian Red Cross one.

The review used a combination of techniques to collect information required to assess the current state of the program, its relevance, effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability. It consisted of a desk review of documents, key informant interviews, field visits to informal settlements in 2 geographical areas of Zahle and Saida. The reviewer also tried to assess the impact of the program and suggested solutions to increase the potential of the program activities to produce the intended impact. Also, strategic planning documents of the LRC, WASH operation planning, reporting and monitoring documents as well as several methodological documents and guidelines on WASH intervention were examined during this stage. The review of the available documents was conducted both before and during key informant interviews and direct observations in the field. Out of this review, a set of key recommendations for the WASH program were suggested to be taken into consideration as listed here: Elaboration of a well-articulated WASH strategy, improve WASH PMER and improve coordination with WASH actors.

Evaluation purpose and scope

Purpose of evaluation

Lebanese Red Cross and Norwegian Red Cross seek to evaluate Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Promotion (WASH) projects funded by NorCross and implemented by LRC from 2015 until 2018, to identify lessons learned to improve and inform future projects and activities, to determine if the implemented work had achieved the desired results reflected in the project package under the signed partnership agreements between the two National Societies.

Scope of evaluation

The WASH program evaluation will focus on NorCross funded projects in the thematic areas of:

i) Hard-WASH: NorCross funded infrastructure in specific ITS given by LRC

ii) Soft-WASH: The soft component support given to LRC WASH program.

Budget allocated to WASH program LRC/NorCross

Evaluation will cover Norcross period from 2015 to 2018:

Partnership Agreement signed LRC NorCross: 2015 - 2017

· Year of implementation 2015: 6,150,000 NOK

· Year of implementation 2016: 6,974,614 NOK

· Year of implementation 2017: 1,438,303.86 USD

Partnership Agreement signed LRC NorCross: 2018 - 2020

· Year of implementation 2018: 1,303,849.53 USD

Evaluation place

The evaluation will take place in NorCross Country Office in Beirut located in LRC Headquarters, while the desk study and field visits will be done to DMU centers and ITS in relevant Governorates within Lebanon. NorCross will facilitate the security clearance of the evaluators for the planned visits:

· In 2015: 1 Governorate

· In 2016: 1 Governorate

· In 2017: 3 governorates

· In 2018: 3 Governorates

Evaluation criteria, objectives, questions

The WASH Evaluator will develop the appropriate methodology and is free to suggest any additional methods and questions that haven’t been mentioned previously. These shall be part of the inception report to be submitted before being deployed to Lebanon to start the evaluation. NorCross will maintain the right to agree or modify the methodology proposed by the evaluator

Criteria

1. Analyze the methodologies used in different activities and propose possible updates for implementation in future projects.

2. Determine the impact of NorCross funded WASH projects as compared to WASH projects funded by other partners within LRC’s WASH Department

3. Determine if the implemented WASH projects achieved

a. Effectiveness

b. Impact

c. Sustainability

d. Efficiency

e. Relevance

1. Answer NorCross’ regional outcome indicators relevant to the WASH sector, these include:

a. % change in the level of WASH related diseases as a result of better WASH practices (Soft)

b. % Change in the WASH Practices of the affected Population (Soft)

c. % Change in the WASH Knowledge of the affected Population (Soft)

d. % of households using efficiently the items included in the distributed hygiene kits (Soft)

e. % change in the level of WASH related diseases as a result of increased access to quality water (Hard)

f. # of people with improved access to Water (Hard)

g. # of people with access to better quality of Water (Hard)

Evaluation methodology

The steps of methodology to be follow are:

1. Desk review. Review all the existing documentation to determine if the set objectives and results had been achieved and, if not, determine the possible causes. Documentation to be reviewed include original project proposals, log frames, different reports (monthly, quarterly, annual and final) and any other existing publications.

2. Field work Lebanon. LRC, the evaluator and NorCross will pre-select a minimum of 8 communities that benefitted from the LRC WASH program. It's important to note that some of the areas may require security clearance for field visits:

· In 2015: 1 ITS to be evaluated

· In 2016: 1 ITS to be evaluated

· In 2017: 3 ITS to be evaluated

· In 2018: 3 ITS to be evaluated

Field work include the organization and implementation of questionnaires for stakeholders, focal group discussion and surveys to be conducted during the evaluation.

Deliverables (or outputs)

The derivable for this evaluation are:

· Inception report with methodological proposal for the evaluation.

· A debriefing session with initial findings, conclusions, recommendations and an executive summary to be presented before departure of country.

· Draft report will be prepared in line with NorCross International Department’s procedures and guidelines. Main stakeholders will be invited to submit their comments in written and feedback should be received from NorCross International Department.

· The final evaluation report shall describe the methodology used, processes conducted and a valid discussion and traceability of shown results. Limitations found, and activities not implemented within the projects/activities evaluated will need to have a proper explanation

The evaluator has the responsibility to assure that he/she has read all documentation submitted by NorCross. Tables produced for the report shall be submitted also in Excel, and all support materials, evidence including transcriptions of interviews obtained by the evaluator shall be made available for NorCross International Department when needed.

Proposed timeline (or schedule)

· Consultant advertisement: 23th July 2019

· Consultant Offers Submission deadline: 11th August 2019

· Consultant Contract Signature: 23rd August 2019

· Inception report: 8th September 2019

· Field visits in Lebanon (20 working days): 16th September 2019

· Presentation of initial findings: 11th October 2019

· Final draft report submission: 3rd November 2019

· Final Report: 24th November 2019

· Publication of report: 2nd December 2019

Evaluation quality and ethical standards

The evaluators should take all reasonable steps to ensure that the evaluation is designed and conducted to respect and protect the rights and welfare of the people and the communities of which they are members, and to ensure that the evaluation is technically accurate, reliable, and legitimate, that it is conducted in a transparent and impartial manner, and that it contributes to organizational learning and accountability. Therefore, the evaluator should adhere to the evaluation standards and specifics, and applicable process outlined in the IFRC Framework for Evaluation. The IFRC Evaluation Standards are:

1. Utility: Evaluations must be useful and used.

2. Feasibility: Evaluations must be realistic, diplomatic, and managed in a sensible, cost-effective manner.

3. Ethics & Legality: Evaluations must be conducted in an ethical and legal manner, with regard for the welfare of those involved in and affected by the evaluation.

4. Impartiality & Independence: Evaluations should be impartial, providing a comprehensive and unbiased assessment that considers the views of all stakeholders.

5. Transparency: Evaluation activities should reflect an attitude of openness and transparency.

6. Accuracy: Evaluations should be technically accurate, providing enough information about the data collection, analysis, and interpretation methods so that its worth or merit can be determined.

7. Participation: Stakeholders should be consulted and meaningfully involved in the evaluation process when feasible and appropriate.

8. Collaboration: Collaboration between key operating partners in the evaluation process improves the legitimacy and utility of the evaluation.

It is also expected that the evaluation will respect the seven Fundamental Principles of the Red Cross and Red Crescent: 1) humanity, 2) impartiality, 3) neutrality, 4) independence, 5) voluntary service, 6) unity, and 7) universality. Further information can be obtained about these principles at: www.ifrc.org/what/values/principles/index.asp

Evaluator qualifications

WASH Evaluation Consultant

o Minimum qualification of a master’s degree in WASH related sciences (engineering, environment or equivalent), or combination of education and relevant work experience.

· Demonstrated experience in planning and implementing final project evaluations required.

· Minimum of 7 years’ experience in monitoring and evaluation required.

· Demonstrated competence in managing quantitative data and carrying out inferential statistics required.

· Proven track of record of conducting qualitative research including the development of interview schedules and qualitative data analysis required.

· Experience in qualitative data collection and data analysis techniques (especially in the design of coding schemes).

· Excellent written and spoken English skills required, Arabic skills considered as an asset.

· Excellent analytical, writing and presentation skills required.

· Strong computer skills in spreadsheet, word processing, database management (MS Access) and statistical analysis software.

· Strong interpersonal and organizational skills required.

· Experience in working in the Red Cross/Red Crescent Movement strongly preferred.

· Familiarity with trends and developments in international hygiene promotion methodologies and approaches support preferred.

· Demonstrated capacity to work both independently and as part of a team.

Logistics Arrangements:

Norwegian Red Cross will cover flight tickets, accommodation and transportation for this job

for more details about this job, please contact nabih.fawaz@redcross.no 

[1] PHAST means Participatory in Hygiene And Sanitation Transformation, and it’s a community based participatory methodology for the control of diarrhoeal diseases. https://www.who.int/water_sanitation_health/publications/phastep/en/

[2] RANAS is the acronym for Risk, Attitudes, Norns, Abilities and Self-regulation methodology on behaviour change. https://www.susana.org/en/knowledge-hub/resources-and-publications/library/details/2397

[3] Ministry of Education and Higher Education

[4] Ministry of Public Health

Interested candidates should submit their applications latest on 11th of August 2019 to tender.mena@redcross.no, with the subject “WASH evaluation LRC NorCross 2019”. Application materials shall include:[1]

1. Curricula Vitae (CV).

2. Cover letter clearly summarizing your experience as it pertains to this assignment, your daily rate, and three professional references.

3. A brief description of your firm or institution (for applicants other than individual contractors).

4. Technical proposal (when appropriate) not exceeding five pages expressing an understanding and interpretation of the TOR, the proposed methodology, and a time and activity schedule.

5. Financial proposal itemizing estimated costs for services rendered (daily consultancy fees), accommodation and living costs, transport costs, stationery costs, and any other related supplies or services required for the evaluation.

6. At least one example of an evaluation report most like that described in this TOR.

Incomplete applications packages will not be considered. Application materials are non-returnable.

We thank you in advance for understanding that only short-listed candidates will be contacted for the next step in the selection process.

[1]Note evaluations do not always require each of these items – this is only a list of examples to consider.