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05 May 2023

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25 January 2023

Expression of Interest (EoI)
Consultant Services to Support the establishment of the ECOWAS Rice Observatory (ERO) Competitive African Rice Platform (CARP) in Sierra Leone
PN: 21.2199.4-105.00
Cosoft No: 83430676

The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH through the Market Oriented Value Chains for Jobs and Growth in The ECOWAS Region (MOVE) project invites qualified individual consultants to express their interest for the above consultancy work.
Background

The Market-Oriented Value Chains for Jobs and Growth in the ECOWAS Region (MOVE) project is commissioned by the Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ) and co-financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and the European Union (EU). The project is implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH. The overall objective of MOVE is to build market-oriented and resilient value chains (rice and cashew) that contribute to the creation of income and employment in the ECOWAS region. Specifically, the goals of MOVE are:
- Increasing the value creation of processing in the ECOWAS region
- Improving the economics/environmental sustainability of agricultural systems
- Improving the marketing of regional products
- Disseminating good practices in promoting inclusive business models
- Strengthening public-private cooperation in policy making

MOVE is implemented in Nigeria, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Sierra Leone, Côte d'Ivoire, and Senegal, and represents the merger of two previously well-established regional projects: The Competitive Cashew Initiative (ComCashew) and the Competitive African Rice Initiative (CARI). Both respective brands CARI and ComCashew are kept under the umbrella of the MOVE project.

MOVE is implemented in Nigeria, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Sierra Leone, Côte d'Ivoire, and Senegal, and represents the merger of two previously well-established regional projects: The Competitive Cashew Initiative (ComCashew) and the Competitive African Rice Initiative (CARI). Both respective brands CARI and ComCashew are kept under the umbrella of the MOVE project.
This assignment is specific to the rice value chain (CARI). Rice is the fastest growing food source in Africa. Demand for rice has been growing faster than anywhere else in the world in recent years and far outstripping the sub-region’s population growth. In West Africa, local production covers only 60% of current demand and yield growth rates lag far behind population growth rates. For this reason, different donor organisations are currently investing in rice projects in West Africa to support ECOWAS Rice Offensive to achieve rice self-sufficiency by 2030. For this reason, the ECOWAS Rice Observatory (ERO) was established with the following three main objectives:
1. Coordinate government, private sector, and donor investments into market driven solutions in support of the ECOWAS rice offensive & its action plan
2. Provide input on policy harmonization from actors’ perspectives across the rice value chain, including women and youth.
3. Facilitate access to finance across the value chain
The ERO aims at helping key actors in the West African rice sector better coordinate policy, value chain development, financing, and R&D to work synergistically. The ERO has have a bottom-up structure, acting at a regional level on the strategic priorities identified by national-level stakeholders. Since the official establishment of the ERO in late 2021, the board members met on a monthly basis virtually to discuss and decide on key aspects of the ERO. Now, to connect the regional level to the national level of all ECOWAS countries, the national chapters – so called Competitive African Rice Platforms (CARPs) – need to be established to connect both bodies. So far, the national chapters in Ghana and Nigeria are established while the ones in Burkina Faso and Cote d’Ivoire are in the pipeline. Sierra Leone is meant to join this list soon.
Overall goal
In light if the ECOWAS rice observatory, the national chapters will subsequently be established in all CARI partner countries. The argument was that increasing the competitiveness of locally produced rice is germane to improving the whole value chain. Therefore, a policy platform is needed to advocate for policies and standard practices that will promote sustainability of rice production and ensure competitiveness of the locally produced rice. This is also in line of the ERO, which is a multi-stakeholder platform that aims at involving the private sector of ECOWAS countries at regional level. Each ECOWAS country is expected to have established one national chapter.
To this end, MOVE requires the service of a consultant that will conceptualize the rice policy platform, identify and support the host organization and facilitate the soft launching of the Competitive African Rice Platform (CARP) in Sierra Leone.
Purpose and Timeframe
To ensure a successful implementation and institutionalisation of the intervention, a long duration of the contract is foreseen.
For this assignment, the Service Provider will be required to complete seven (7) clusters of implementation for the period spanning 20th February 2023 until 29th of February 2024
Geographic areas of implementation
There are three geographical zones of implementation under this intervention is mainly Freetown with expectations of traveling within the country if required.
Qualifications
- Education/training (2.2.1): Master degree in Business Administration, International Development, Economics, Agriculture or related field
- Language (2.2.2): Fluent English (C1)
- General professional experience (2.2.3): 10 years’ experience in the agricultural sector of Sierra Leone, preferably in the rice value chain
- Specific professional experience (2.2.4): 3 years of experience of private sector development; business development of food processing or supply chain development, or 3 years’ experience in working with multi-actor platforms/ stakeholder management
- Leadership/management experience (2.2.5): 6 years of experience in project management
- Regional experience (2.2.6): 7 years in Sierra Leone
- Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.2.7): 2 years of experience in working with DC projects within the agricultural sector, value chains, private sector development, access to finance, agricultural extension or business advisory service provision
- Other (2.2.8): Specialist in rice production system in Africa and familiar with the rice sector in Sierra Leone
Submission of Expressions of Interest
Eligible experts should submit their “Expression of Interest” ONLY via Email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. not later than 4th of February 2023 4:30 PM local time, clearly marked with “Consultant services to Support the establishment of the ECOWAS Rice Observatory (ERO) Competitive African Rice Platform (CARP) Cosoft No: 83430676”

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05 May 2023

EU DEPLOYS ELECTION OBSERVATION MISSIONnvitation by the Electoral Commission for Sierra Leone ECSL), the European Union (EU) will deploy an EU Election Observation Mission (EOM) to observe the multitier elections scheduled for 24th June, 2023.

High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, has appointed Evin Incir, Member of the European Parliament, as Chief Observer of the 2023 EU EOM to Sierra Leone. The EU previously deployed EOMs to Sierra Leone in 2018, 2012, 2007 and 2002, as well as an Election Follow-up Mission in 2021.

High Representative, Josep Borrell, said: “Over the last 21 years, Sierra Leoneans have built a hard-won peace.

The forthcoming elections will be crucial for the future of the country as well as for the West Africa region. The EU, with the deployment of an Electoral Observation Mission for the fifth time, confirms its long-term commitment to supporting competitive, transparent and peaceful elections in Sierra Leone. Under the leadership of Chief Observer Incir, the EU EOM will provide an independent, evidence-based assessment of the electoral process and its final report will be an important contribution to Sierra Leone’s efforts and aspirations to strengthening its democracy.”

The Chief Observer, Evin Incir, said: “It is a great honour for me to lead this Election Observation Mission, which I assume with a great sense of responsibility. I look forward to engaging with various electoral stakeholders and trust that state authorities, political parties and candidates will play their part in promoting inclusive, credible and peaceful elections.”

Credit: EU Press Release-Sierra Leone
Date Issue: 3/5/2023

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30 November 2022

Call for Expression of Interest (EoI)
Consultancy to develop the Public Health Emergency Operations Centre manual (Handbook) in Sierra Leone and Liberia using the WHO PHEOC Framework
Project Number: 19.2059.4-007.00
Cosoft No: 83427365

The Regional Programme support to Pandemic Prevention in the ECOWAS Region -RPPP was implemented by the Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH in the region, initially for 5 years (from 2016) with funding appropriated by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and the European union. This phase ended in June 2021. A second phase has been approved and started on August 2021 as a technical cooperation (TC) follow-up module "Support to pandemic prevention in the ECOWAS region" – RPPP2. It is commissioned by BMZ with a duration of three years (07/2021 to 06/2024) and co-funded by the European Union with the aims to improve disease protection for the population in the ECOWAS region (programme objective). Under the objective "Promoting priority health strategies and pro-grammes", the project’s target indicators reflect Priority Programme 3 of the West African Health Organization's (WAHO) Strategic Plan: Epidemics and Health Emergencies.

The current TC module makes a direct contribution to the programme's overall objective by strengthening the One Health (OH) focused pandemic prevention and control system in the ECOWAS space with the official beneficiaries being the Regional Centre for Surveillance and Disease Control (RCSDC), the Regional Animal Health Centre and corresponding state member National Coordinating institutions.

The RCSDC at the regional level and the NCIs at the national level play a central role in a functioning regional pandemic prevention and control system. The RCSDC advises and supports the NCIs in ECOWAS member states in building and strengthening core capacities in accordance with the IHR (2005), such as pandemic preparedness and response, risk communication, crisis management, laboratory capacities, human resources and disease monitoring and control. Despite improvements in the implementation of the IHR (2005) core capacity building attained since 2016, insufficiency in the functionality of EOC remain within member states NCIs across the region. This has the potential to hamper the capacity of NCIs to perform epidemic and pandemic prevention and mitigation functions as well as the emergency preparedness and response coordination capacities of the NCIs.

The RPPP2 project is supporting the roll out of Surveillance, Outbreak Response Management and Analysis System (SORMAS), in Ghana and Nigeria.

The project has a direct focus on NCIs in six (6) countries, including Liberia; Togo Guinea; Burkina Faso; Mali and Sierra Leone in which the module mandate relates to strengthening selected International Health Regulations (IHR) core capacities including those in relation to multisectoral coordination, Risk Communication and Community Engagement and public health emergency operations (fully functional emergency response centres). In pursuing this mandate, the RPPP aims to support the standardization of normative technical guidelines pertaining to the functionality of the Emergency Operations Centre.
To this effect, therefore RPPP is seeking a highly experienced and resourceful consultant to align national PHEOC operating manual (handbook) in Sierra Leone and Liberia, to the regional WHO framework for Public Health Emergency Operations Centre including the legislative context which legitimizes the emergency preparedness and response function and authority of the EOC.

1. Prequalification
The following prequalification documents are required from prospective bidders:
a) A copy of their resume
b) A copy of the highest academic degree achieved
c) Reference of international organisation for which candidate has worked
Submission of Expressions of Interest

2.
Eligible experts should submit their “Expression of Interest” ONLY via Email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. not later than Monday 12th December 2022, 4:30 PM local time, with email subject “Recruitment of a Consultant for the Adaptation of the Public Health Emergency Operations Centre Handbooks in Sierra Leone and Liberia Cosoft No: 83427365”.
Only prequalified bidders will be contacted with detailed Terms of Reference and tender documentation for submission of technical and financial bids. The eligible candidates should also be able to demonstrate their ability and willingness to travel to Liberia to attend and/or moderate in person consultancy related workshop.

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02 May 2023

2023 Orange Social Venture Prize Competition

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16 October 2022

Request for Proposals, Security service for 12 months. Helen Keller International is seeking to contract a security agency that is trustworthy and reliable and can secure the Helen Keller international premises and property.

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02 May 2023

2023 Orange Social Venture Prize Women’s Competition

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07 August 2022