Increasing Local Capacity Activity in the Eastern and Souther Caribbean
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Mission to Eastern and Southern Caribbean (ESC) based in Barbados is performing this market survey to determine if there are local and regional (within the Eastern and Southern Caribbean region) companies or organizations interested in,and capable of implementing and managing a multi-faceted activity aimed at increasing the capacity of local development entities in the Southern and Eastern Caribbean region through the USAIDâ₏™s Local Capacity for Local Solutions Activity. USAID/ESC provides development assistance to organizations and nation states in the Eastern and Southern Caribbean (which comprises Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago) and Grenada. Overall, this development assistance seeks to (1) reduce youth involvement in crime and violence; (2) reduce risks and adapt to the impacts of global climate change; and (3) achieve epidemic control of HIV/AIDS throughout the region. Additional information on the regional USAID strategy can be found at: https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1862/ESC%20RDCS%20Public%20Ver.%2 0UPDATED%206-12-15%20CAR.pdf B. Purpose/Objective The purpose of the Local Capacity for Local Solutions Activity (LC4LS) is to increase the capacity of selected non-profit and non-governmental organizations to expand and sustainably provide services throughout the CARICOM region. To achieve this purpose, USAID plans to finance a select number of development grants through an Implementing Partner (IP) for activities proposed by local and regional organizations that meet capacity and eligibility criteria while providing initial and on-going administrative, organizational, and management training and support. The LC4LS Activity hopes to achieve its purpose through successful and creative implementation approaches as well as skills building to be managed by a selected IP capable of providing the regional multi-faceted assistance and supervision of the Activity will require. The tasks fall into three general areas: A. Managing grants. The selected local or regional company or organization would serve as USAIDâ₏™s Implementing Partner (IP) and would lead in identifying, mentoring and strengthening local and regional organizations capable of designing and managing programs that further the USAID/ESC Mission strategy in the areas of youth development, improving the regionâ₏™s resilience and adaptation to global climate change, and achieve epidemic control of HIV/AIDS. The compendium of projects to be financed would provide alternative approaches not covered by the Missionâ₏™s signature projects but it will be critically important that they are coordinated with the Missionâ₏™s lead activity in each thematic area. The achievement of the development aims of each grant will be one measure of success. B. Building Institutional, Administrative, and Managerial Capacity and Sustainability of emerging development non-governmental organizations and institutions (NGOs)1 that receive a grant under the Activity. The IP will be responsible for carrying out an institutional needs assessment and designing a capacity strengthening program for each participating institution, including milestones. It is expected that capacity building will be achieved through a combination of formal, non-formal, build on-the-job, and other capacity building methodologies. Thematic areas will include but are not limited to 1) Individual Capacities (leadership and staff development); 2) Organizational Capacities; 3) Resource Mobilization Capacities; and 4) External Relations Capacities. C. Capacity Strengthening of Non-grant Receiving Organizations and Institutions. The IP will be expected to design, deliver, and evaluate effectiveness of capacity building activities, likely in conjunction with Section B activities, for non-grant receiving NGOs working in USAID/ESCâ₏™s assistance areas. The goal will be to strengthen institutions able to design and manage projects; conduct proper organizational planning, budgeting and management; monitor and evaluate their project portfolios; and build a capacity to develop sustainable sources of funding for any current or future USG investments. Together, execution of these three tasks listed above will fully implement the Local Capacity for Local Solutions Activity (LC4LS). The IP will be responsible for the capacity-building initiatives and soliciting, reviewing and ultimately awarding and monitoring the grants described above. Successful implementation will address the objectives and goals of USAIDâ₏™s regional development and cooperation strategy, as well as contribute to achieving the technical services mandate of each proposing organization in the technical areas covered by the USAID strategy, as described. Proposals/applications to undertake the tasks mentioned herein may be solicited through several potential mechanisms such as Annual Program Statements, Request for Proposals (RFP), and/or Requests for Application (RFA), among others. At an early point in the selection process, each emerging development organization submitting a proposal will be assessed for administrative, financial management and technical capacity as well as its prospects for achieving organizational, financial and technical sustainability. The IP will be a full partner and potentially lead this assessment process. USAIDâ₏™s anticipated development outcome for the LC4LS activity is multiple regional development institutions capable of continuing to supply high quality services2 after completion of the USAID activity and into the future. D. Services Sought USAID is seeking information and expressions of interest from sources interested in applying to become USAIDâ₏™s Implementing Partner (IP) for this Activity. The IP may be a local or regional institution or company. It may be a for-profit or not-for-profit entity. It may also be a consortium of organizations or a joint venture of businesses or companies capable of operating regionally. For the Activity, the IP will provide the full gamut of support, management and technical assistance services outlined in Sections A and B above, for the emerging development organizations selected to participate in the LC4LS Activity. In addition, the IP will fulfill monitoring and valuation requirements, perform technical and administrative assessments, ensure coordination with the Missionâ₏™s lead activities under each of the Missionâ₏™s objective areas, and provide technical, financial, procurement, and administrative oversight training. Moreover, as sustainability of each emerging organization is an important result, the IP will help selected organizations to build or strengthen their fund raising/development capacity to assist them to move to financial, as well as technical, organizational and managerial, sustainability. Implementation of the Activity will require that the IP perform management services for USAID. One such service will be to assist in identifying emerging development organizations that might be considered for inclusion in the Activity. A second is to assist selected emerging development organizations to strengthen their administrative, financial and management services. The third is to assist grantee organizations to become sustainable so that they can evolve into capable development partners to the development organizations and governments of the region. This might include international development organizations, regional development entities, world and regional development banks (e.g., CDB), or private companies operating in the region, among others. Illustrative Tasks to be undertaken in conjunction with USAID/ESC include: 1) Solicitation Phase i. Defining the methodology and selection criteria for funding and participation proposals. Criteria will include both requirements for proposals and qualifications of the organizations requesting funding. ii. Identifying local and regional organizations with potential for receiving grants as well as potential for progress toward sustainability. iii. Formalizing the methods for soliciting proposals in the region. iv. Identifying non-grant receiving local and regional organizations to receive capacity strengthening support. 2) Award Phase i. Developing post-submission selection methodology. This will necessarily include an initial phase of proposal evaluation to develop a â₏œshort listâ₏ of qualified proposals based on criteria and relevance to Mission priorities and a â₏œshort listâ₏ of non-grant receiving participant organizations. ii. Conducting initial due diligence of the proposing organizations in the short list. iii. Formalizing the selection system for awards with USAID/ESC. This will require some form of proposal evaluation and ranking of the proposals and the organizations based on criteria in the solicitation for proposals. iv. Completing a full due diligence assessment for the organizations selected for funding. This will include finalization of the award documents to include reporting requirements, work plan, key personnel, etc. Awards will be made and administered by the IP. v. In conjunction with the ESC Mission, conducting the final selection of awards. vi. Processing the awards for proposals to be funded. vii. Conducting required reviews for environmental compliance approval by USAID/ESC for selected awards. 3) Implementation Phase i. The IP will manage all approved LC4LS activities, including oversight of financial, administrative, and technical status, and regular monitoring and evaluation reporting. The IP will provide the Mission with regular report updates. The IP should have sufficient administrative and technical resources available to conduct this requirement. ii. In order to ensure that the NGO organizations that receive funding and capacity building move toward sustainability, the IP will provide innovative, high quality capacity-building including organizational, managerial, administrative and financial system development, fund raising methods, programmatic expertise including activity design and implementation, advocacy and public involvement, etc. Activities and training will be opened to additional USAID grantees outside of the LC4LS grantee group. It is expected that the overall capacity-building approach and methodologies will be developed through new USAID procurement and collaboration instruments (e.g. Broad Agency Announcement (BAA)) intended to accelerate USAIDâ₏™s ability to discover, test and scale game-changing innovations by co-creating and co-designing a development solution. Only those organizations and individuals willing to engage in this approach should respond to this Sources Sought activity. iii. The IP will develop and implement the LC4LS activity M&E Plan, in conjunction with the M&E Officer USAID/ESC Mission. This plan must also address the requirements and technical areas of the Missionâ₏™s Performance Management Plan (PMP). Activity outputs will be clearly defined with benchmarks to be reported based on progress and timephased reporting periods demarcated. iv. The IP will ensure that all funded proposals have work plans and timely reporting requirements that include financial reviews, environmental requirements, progress evaluations, and end of activity close out procedures defined. 4) Lessons Learned that are Adaptable to other USAID Mission Activities i. USAID/ESC has principal projects in each of the sectoral areas addressed by the LC4LS activity (youth development, health, and climate change). Over the course of implementing the various grants approved under the Activity, the IP shall identify methodologies and activities that are successful in building sustainability and institutional capacity that could be replicated by the Missionâ₏™s principal projects. This should be documented as â₏œlessons learnedâ₏ in the periodic reports of the IP. The IP will be expected to provide camera-ready beneficiary-focused success stories on various aspects of the program. ii. As the Mission may be looking for potential new partners to work under various elements of the principal activities, the IP shall also identify organizations that have become stronger and are considered to have improved their sustainability. These identified organizations may be presented to the region for consideration by other regional development supporters for future partnerships. E. Anticipated Period and Place of Performance The anticipated period of performance is for five years (2016-2020) for a total estimated amount of up to US$16,000,000.00, subject to funds availability. This estimate includes all funding for activity management, funding for proposals, technical assistance, training, and reporting. Programs and grants may be implemented in all ten countries served by USAID/ESC (Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago) and Grenada. However, this activity is not required to work in all countries in the region. Rather, the Mission is seeking out a select set of development organizations or foundations with the goals, vision and potential to become strong sustainable organizations in their sector and to contribute to that sector and as a contributing member of civil society at the national and regional level. Submission Guidelines Interested organizations should submit a statement describing the capabilities of the organization as they relate to the purpose and requirements outlined above and respond to all of the following questions based on the information provided in this document: ï‚· Each potential IP should prepare a summary background statement that summarizes its understanding of the capacity of local emerging development organizations in the Eastern and Southern Caribbean region, briefly identifying constraints to the development of such organizations. ï‚· Potential IPs should evaluate the illustrative tasks indicated and address how its organization might seek to accomplish them. In addition, each IP is encouraged to add additional tasks or provide alternative strategies in its response that address the challenges faced by potential grantee organizations. ï‚· Each potential IP should propose an organizational structure, complete with skill sets and locational information that will achieve the tasks indicated or suggested. ï‚· Each potential IP should address how it has incorporated innovative, pioneering, cutting edge methodologies, approaches, or concepts into its work with particular attention paid to working in a geographically dispersed setting. In-house developed innovations are of particular interest. ï‚· Finally, potential IPs should outline any additional or other approaches they feel would be important to the achievement of the results outlined for this project. USAID/ESC is looking for creative, well-grounded, knowledgeable responses to the issues raised and tasks outlined in this Sources Sought notice. IP responses to this Sources Sought may be incorporated into subsequent procurement documents should the Mission decide to go forward with the Activity. Responses may also be used to help create a short list of potential IPs that will receive subsequent procurement documents. Statements sent in response to this notice should not exceed six (6) pages (including attachments and charts) using an 11-point font size minimum. The statement must include the following information: 1)Organization name, address, email address, Web site address, telephone number, and size and type of ownership for the organization; and 2) Tailored capability statements addressing the particulars of this effort, with appropriate documentation supporting claims of organizational and staff capability. If significant subcontracting or teaming is anticipated in order to deliver technical capability, organizations should address the administrative and management structure of such arrangements. The statements may be sent electronically in Microsoft Word or Adobe Portable Document Format (pdf)NLT February 12, 2016, at 5:00 p.m. to JosĂ© Luis NĂºñez, Acquisition and Assistance Specialist, at jnunez@usaid.gov. All responses must be received by the specified due date and time. Disclaimer and Important Notices This notice does not obligate USAID to make an award or otherwise pay for the information provided in the response. USAID reserves the right to use information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate. Respondents are advised that USAID is under no obligation to acknowledge receipt of the information received or provide feedback to respondents with respect to any information submitted. After a review of the responses received, a pre-solicitation synopsis and solicitation may be published on the Federal Business Opportunities website, www.fedbizopps.gov or Federal Grants Opportunities, www.grants.gov. Responses to this notice will not be considered responses to a solicitation. Confidentiality No proprietary, confidential or sensitive information should be included in your response. USAID reserves the right to use any non-proprietary information in any resulting solicitation(s). Footnote: 1 For the purposes of this Sources Sought, emerging development NGOs are defined as those organizations that already have a demonstrated capacity to implement projects and activities that contribute to the achievement of the objectives of the ESC Regional Development Strategy yet require organizational, administrative, and managerial capacity-building to ensure longevity and sustainability. 2 These services will seek to (1) reduce youth involvement in crime and violence; (2)
Acquisition Assistance Specialist
Phone 809.368.7566
