Consultant for Preparing Training and Capacity Building Manual in Vietnamese for Sensitization and Awareness raising for REDD+ among the grassroots forest stakeholder in Vietnam

Background 
 
RECOFTC  –  The  Centre  for  People  and  Forests,  Bangkok,  is  granted  by  Norwegian  Agency  for Development Cooperation (Norad) to implement a project on Grassroots capacity building for
Reducing  Emissions  from  Deforestation  and  forest  Degradation  and  foster  conservation, sustainable management of forests, and enhancement of forest carbon stocks (REDD+) in the Asia Pacific. The first phase (August 2009 ? July 2010) of the project was implemented in three countries namely Nepal, Indonesia and Lao PDR. Norad has further extended financial support to RECOFTC to continue the project implementation in the second phase (Aug. 2010 ? July 2013) in four countries, including three from phase I and adding Vietnam as fourth country for phase II. 
 
The goal of the project is the “Grassroots forest sector stakeholders in the Asia?Pacific region actively contribute to the success of REDD+ mechanism and take full advantage of the resultant benefits for local socio?economic development”. Purpose of the project: Key gaps in knowledge among  grassroots  forest  sector  stakeholders  are  addressed  enabling  them  to  participate  to their full potential in the planning and implementation of REDD+ related activities. 
 
In  Vietnam,  the  project  is  targeting  to  train,  build  capacity  and  raise  awareness  on  REDD+  of grassroots  forest  stakeholders  in  four  provinces  namely  Bac  Kan,  Ha  Tinh,  Lam  Dong  and  Ca Mau. The project takes cascade approach of capacity building from national to grassroots level. The partner organizations in each province either DARD or its Technical  Sub?Department. The
project is also open to collaborate with the local NGO partners, including Center for Sustainable Rural Development (SRD), Center for Sustainable Development of Mountain areas (CSDM), and Center  of  Research  and  Development  in  Upland  areas  (CERDA)  located  in  Hanoi  and  Ha  Tinh Center  for  Community  Development  (HCCD).  To  address  the  local  needs  more  precisely  a capacity building need assessment (CBNA) was conducted in 2011 and final draft report on the findings of this CBNA was made available in November of the same year. Based on the results of the  CBNA  findings  and  further  discussions  with  the  provincial  teams,  2012  detailed  annual action  plan  of  each  province  has  been  prepared  and  agreed  upon  by  both  RECOFTC  and  the
province.  The  project  capacity  building  activities  will  be  organized  at  three  levels,  from provincial down to the community, targeting forestry related stakeholders at each level. 
 
In 2011 RECOFTC organized two five?day training of trainer’s (ToT) program for 34 participants from  Lam  Dong  and  Hanoi.  The  objectives  of  this  TOT  course  are  to  enable  the  potential trainers of the four provinces to effectively implement the Capacity Building Programme of the NORAD  Grassroots  Capacity  Building  for  REDD+  Project  in  Vietnam  through  equipping  them
with  necessary  skills  and  knowledge.  Accordingly,  the  ToT  programs  focused  on:  (1)  Climate change  and REDD+, (2) REDD+  initiates  and  Requirements  in  Vietnam; MRV;  FPIC and  benefit sharing from forest carbon trade, (3) REDD+ in the context of Community Forestry (CF), and (4) Training  methodology.  Prior  to  delivering  the  training  programs,  the  trainers  were  asked  to prepare the training material on the selected topics, which will be shared with the consultant. 
 
At the global level, the REDD+ debates have generated a considerable volume of information in a  short  time,  some  of  it  contradictory,  most  of  it  complex  in  nature,  and  all  of  it  subject  to
continuous revision and correction in the lights of technical, institutional and political changes evolving  through  global  discourses  on  the  climate  change  and  REDD+.  As  the  developments related to REDD+ are rapidly unfolding, the capacity needs associated with these changes are extensive and evolving quickly, including the institutional and practical capacity to engage with the  grassroots forest  stakeholders  in  the  process  and  provide  opportunities  for  them  to  take advantages  from  the  multiple  benefits  that  REDD+  mechanism  promise  to  hold.  One  of  the basic principle of developing training manual on REDD+ through this initiative is that in order to achieve  optimum  participation  of  grassroots  forest  stakeholders,  information  on  REDD+  must be  disseminated  in  an  accessible,  flexible,  and  dynamic  format  that  meets  specific  practical needs. In view of a number of efforts being made on different aspects of REDD+ in Vietnam, a need  was  felt  to  pool  all  the  resources,  and  develop  common  training  and  capacity  building manuals in Vietnamese, for wider use across different sectors of the forest management.
 
At the regional level RECOFTC has already developed a generic training manual on REDD for the training of trainers, mainly targeted at national level stakeholders, and therefore it was decided
to work upon this manual and with the help of other ongoing initiatives upgrade and revise the same  to  incorporate  latest  developments  and  make  it  available  for  all  the  stakeholders.
Moreover,  since  the  focus  of  the  RECOFTC’s  project  is  on  the  grassroots  stakeholders,  it  was also  felt  strongly  that  two  separate  manuals  be  developed,  one  addressing  national  and  sub national stakeholders and the other for community or grassroots stakeholders. The Consultant is therefore suggested to work on the ToT manual developed by RECOFTC to further revise it
and contextualize for Vietnam for national and sub national and community level stakeholders. A  copy  of  the  latest  version  of  the  manual  will  be  shared  with  the  consultant.  This  proposal
therefore  is  aimed  to  achieve  the  above  stated  goal.  The  specific  objectives  of  this  joint initiative are: 
 
Objectives
 
The main objective of the proposed project is to prepare two sets of training manuals that are useful  to  sensitize  provincial,  district  and  community  levels  stakeholders  on  REDD+,  its  policy
and  programs,  mechanism,  institutional  arrangements,  issues,  governance,  methodology,  etc. in the context of Vietnam.
 
Indicative Methodology
 
The methodology to prepare the training manual is proposed as follows.
1. Review the training manual developed by RECOFTC and work on the same to revise and modify to develop sub national and grassroots level training manual in Vietnamese
2. Conduct  desk  review  of  other  training  manuals  available  in  forestry  sector  in  Vietnam and elsewhere.
3. Conduct  desk  review  of  general  climate  change  and  REDD  training  manuals  that  are available elsewhere.
4. Review  the  training  and  capacity  building  needs  assessment  for  REDD  conducted  by RECOFTC for Vietnam to address the recommendations 
5. Review the training content developed for two ToT programs and incorporate the same appropriately in the manual
6. Synthesize  resource  materials,  methodological  insights,  case  studies  and  required information  from  experiences  and  lessons  of  various  REDD  projects  initiative  that  are currently operational in Vietnam. 
7. Organize  interaction  and  consultations  with  various  key  institutions  and  individuals, project personnel and independent reviewers to develop the draft manual. 
8. Sharing  the  draft  manual  among  relevant  partners  for  their  critical  comments  and feedback.
 
Roles and Responsibilities 
 
The consultant is advised to undertake following activities in order to prepare training manual in Vietnamese.
1. Review the relevant literatures that are available in the context of REDD in Vietnam;
2. Develop  an  outline  for  the  training  manuals  with  a  brief  description  on  the  approach and methods and circulate them to RECOFTC to get their feedback and comments and finalize the outline; 
3. Develop the content of the training manuals, resource materials and tools for training for each set of stakeholders;
4. Prepare the Vietnam specific case studies;
5. Pool the insights from different key institutions and individuals working in the REDD and climate change field;
6. Consult  the  relevant  stakeholders  and  acquire  and  incorporate  feedback  from  them during the manual development process;
7. Incorporate the feedback and suggestions from the independent reviewer and relevant stakeholders;
8. Test  the  manuals  at  the  practical  setting  by  delivering  few  sessions  and  collect  the feedback from the participants in order to feed into the revision process. This should be done  at  lease  once  at  all  three  levels  including    the  provincial,  the  district  and  the community one. 
9. Submit  the  final  drafts  of  two  sets  of  manuals,  one  for  national  and  sub  national stakeholders and the other for community level stakeholders.    
 
Output/Deliverable
 
The key outputs of this assignment are as follows:
 
• An  outline  for  each  set  of  training  and  capacity  building  manual  in  English  and Vietnamese supported by a brief description of different steps to be followed during the process, including content  development,  Type  of  resource  material  and  specific Vietnamese  case  study,  selection  of  tools,  consultations,  review  of  manual  and  its dissemination within the date assigned under this assignment. 
• A training and capacity building manual for REDD+ in Vietnamese for national and sub national level stakeholders (National level officials, district officials responsible for forest management, NGO representatives, civil society organizations etc.). 
• A  training  and  capacity  building  manual  for  REDD+  in  Vietnamese  for  grassroots stakeholders  (forest  user  groups,  indigenous  people  and  local  communities,  NGO representatives etc.). 
• Incorporate  a  section  in  each  manual  listing  down  the  available  resource  materials  on REDD  in  Vietnam  and  elsewhere,  including  a  checklist  of  most  prominent  websites  as appropriate.
 
Consultant  is  advised  to  consider  following  important  things,  while  preparing  the  training manuals.  The  content,  methods  and  tools  of  delivery  of  capacity  building  programs  and  time
frame and time line for the same are important consideration, which need to be clearly spelt out in the action plan that will be submitted by the consultant and agreed upon by RECOFTC before initiating the manual preparation process. 
 
It  is  advised  that  for  national  and  sub?national  training  and  capacity  building  events,  a  time frame  of  4?6  days  and  for  community  level  training  a  time  frame  of  1?2  days  may  be
appropriate.  Therefore  training  manuals,  resource  materials,  tools,  methods  etc.  should  be accordingly  developed  in  the  manuals.  For  grassroots  stakeholders,  it  is  highly  desirable  that
the  training  content  and  material  is  simplified  enough  to  convey  it  more  effectively,  using appropriate tools and methods. 
 
An indicative outline of the content of the manual may cover (but not limited to) the following topics:
1. Context of climate change and environmental services (science, issues, impact, response, etc.).
2. REDD+ (Idea, architecture, evolution, opportunities, challenges, etc.).
3. REDD and Forestry in Vietnam (Forestry contexts in Vietnam, implications of REDD in different forest management and governance modalities and regimes, etc.) 
4. Conditions for REDD (some technical specifications such as additionally, leakage, permanence, MRV, etc.)
5. Issues in REDD in the context of Vietnam (FPIC, social and environmental safeguards, gender inclusion, conflict, benefit sharing, etc.)
6. Policies, processes and initiatives of REDD in Vietnam
7. Institutional aspects and governance of REDD in Vietnam
8. Understanding different standards in REDD 
9. Potential implications of REDD in Vietnam’s forestry sector and socio?economic aspects
10. Carbon market and trade
11. Glossary of ongoing REDD initiatives in Vietnam
12. Besides  the  content  and  other  technical  details,  the  manual  should  have  a  module  on how to develop facilitation skills as well.
 
Duration
All matters called for in this TOR must be completed within two months from the date of signing of the agreement.
 
Remuneration
Under this assignment a modest amount of money has been tentatively earmarked for the activities described in the TOR. Cost?effectiveness is an important criterion for selection of the consultants. The successful applicant will sign a contract with RECOFTC and payments could be made in several installments according to the actual progress. 

Qualifications for applicants
Applicant could be any individual or a group of people or an organization that clearly demonstrate their capacity and show significant experience in carrying out the activities detailed in the TOR.  Applicants are required to provide their CVs of the main staff members who will carry out the work. Joint proposals with other organizations are encouraged but not required.
 
Application 
Interested candidates should send their full curriculum vitae and an application letter in English to the following email address [email protected] with the subject title: “Application for position of consultant for REDD+ training manual development”. For more information, please write to the above?mentioned email address or contact Mr. Vu Huu Than via phone number +84 (0)4 3726 4745 Ext. 13.

Deadline
The deadline for this application is May 01, 2012. Please kindly note that only short listed applicants will be contacted for an interview.