Consultancy: Cooperative Development and Management Expert – SPRODETA

1. CASA PROGRAMME OVERVIEW

CASA is an FCDO – International Climate Finance (ICF) funded programme driving global investment for inclusive climate-resilient agri-food systems that increase smallholder incomes. CASA makes the case to impact and return-oriented investors for increased investment in agribusinesses that work with smallholder supply chains. The programme achieves this goal by:

• Demonstrating the commercial viability and investment-readiness of small and medium-sized (SME) agribusinesses with significant smallholder supply chains.
• Helping investors to increase the impact of their investments through the provision of inclusive technical assistance.
• Strengthening the socio-legal empowerment of smallholders within value chains; and
• Tackling the information and evidence gaps holding back investment

For demonstrating the commercial and development potential of smallholder sourcing models, CASA focuses on catalytic interventions in the agriculture sectors of Ethiopia, Malawi, Nepal and Rwanda that support agri-SMEs prepare for and secure investment while connecting smallholders to commercial markets.

CASA’s work on research and communications is structured around identifying constraints, opportunities and addressing evidence gaps through research; shaping the debate on smallholder agriculture to influence actions of investors, governments and donors; and creating networking opportunities through events and stakeholder engagement.

2. ASSIGNMENT BACKGROUND

2.1 Partnership with SPRODETA

As part of its work in Malawi, CASA has partnered with SPRODETA – a local business that operates several agro-based enterprises including poultry – with the aim of facilitating the setting up of an inclusive poultry supply chain to contribute to expansion of the production volumes for indigenous poultry to meet the growing demand and increase sales volumes and profits for the company and smallholders. Through the partnership SPRODETA seek to set up an outgrower scheme through cooperative members to provide the company with live chickens, (as well as soybean and maize) which the company already offtakes from among the farmers that are not currently involved in poultry production at any meaningful scale. To achieve this SPRODETA agribusiness intends to engage 1,500 smallholder farmers (including women and the youth), under two cooperatives, Kayolo and Chipereka, with the aim of reinforcing their capacity in cooperative management, poultry production management and develop offtaker agreements for chickens, maize and soybean. This is aimed at contributing to the members economic empowerment, food and nutrition security at household level while meeting the growing market demand for SPRODETA. In the long run, the company would like to further increase its aggregation capacity, attract commercial/impact investment and use the funding to expand its business operations by investing in a feed mill, incubation and hatchery facilities, processing equipment for dressed chickens, refrigerated vehicle and freezers for storage of processed products.

To successfully deliver this tasks, CASA Malawi now intends to engage the services of a short-term cooperative development/ management expert STTA to support SPRODETA provide a refresher training in cooperative management to strengthen existing functions towards a successful execution of the poultry enterprise among the members. This is expected to support the outgrowers improve their collective productivity in poultry as a business.

2.2 Partner Brief Background

SPRODETA Agribusiness is a commercial arm and a subsidiary of SPRODETA NGO. The local NGO was formed in 2009 and registered in 2012 with the aim of empowering marginalized men, women, and youths to achieve sustainable development. The vision of the NGO arm is to have food secure, resilient, economically viable, and empowered communities. Their mission is to enable beneficiaries to come together and carry out inclusive and sustainable development initiatives.

SPRODETA Agribusiness, CASA’s partner under this project, was incorporated as a private company, limited by shares on 6^th June 2020, fully compliant with statutory requirements pursuant to the Companies Act, (Chapter 46:02 of 2013). The company was set-up to bring on board a commercial aspect within SPRODETA NGO activities by undertaking commercial investments towards product aggregation, marketing and most importantly investment in value addition for improved incomes for smallholder producers. Towards this end, SPRODETA Agribusiness focuses on processing and marketing of products that are promoted by the NGO arm. SPRODETA Agribusiness offers a reliable marketing avenue for the products promoted by the NGO. Its activities are independent of the NGO activities, but it benefits from already organised and trained farmers to conduct its operations. The company has so far invested in construction and equipping the business centre in Ekwendeni, 20 km from the city of Mzuzu, that will serve as a breeding unit (incubator/hatchery), processing centre for meat (dressing chickens and goat meat) and corn-soy blend, as well as an outlet shop. The processing centre will have the capacity to process 2,500 chickens a month. The company is already working with two cooperatives namely Kayolo from Mzimba South and Chipeleka from Mzimba North.

3.OBJECTIVES OF THE ASSIGNMENT

The main objective of this assignment is to set up a sustainable business management system for smallholders under the SPRODETA planned outgrower scheme through provision of cooperative management training to SPRODETA field staff, leaders and some members so that they can provide technical backstopping support to the cooperatives that will be engaged in poultry production. This is aimed at reinforcing proper management practices for continuity of cooperative business and potential linkages with market-based service providers.

The technical assistant is expected to cover topics such as leadership, governance, financial management, collective marketing and group dynamics. The selected STTA will draw lessons from previous training materials and training manuals developed under Cohort 1 and 2, where applicable. The training materials should be adapted and aligned to the needs of the cooperatives/outgrowers targeted by SPRODETA. The training content will be simplified into a format that can easily be used for further trainings by the trainers trained. Thus, through the intervention, CASA will support in building the capacity of SPRODETA staff and cooperative leaders in cooperative development.

The STTA is expected to mainstream elements of food and nutrition security; GESI and climate change adaptation during the trainings through allocation of slots for guest resource persons on these topics or incorporating the same in the training materials with input from CASA cross-cutting experts. The cross-cutting training sessions will be delivered through existing CASA engaged crosscut experts (or you from their input) or a local service provider that SPRODETA is linked to.

4. DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

Under the overall management of the CASA Market Manager for Poultry, the STTA will support SPRODETA to develop and execute the cooperative management training delivery and training plan.

The specific duties of the STTA for the pilot phase include:

• Conduct a rapid technical capacity needs assessment, including evaluating the capacity needs of the cooperatives towards poultry enterprise among the members.
• Liaise with SPRODETA to agree on who should be trained, numbers and location for training sessions. Plan to conduct two training sessions: one for Chipeleka and the other for Kayolo Cooperative.
• Fully integrate Gender and Social Inclusion (GESI) in the trainee identification process and in facilitating election of group leaders, and proactively incorporating women and youths that have requisite skills and competencies.
• Review existing group dynamics training materials, aligning them to the identified knowledge and capacity gaps in the cooperative management aspects which must culminate into the production of training materials for SPRODETA field staff and group leaders or as agreed with SPRODETA.
• Conduct training in cooperative management for at least all leaders of the two cooperatives and SPRODETA field staff with special focus on the poultry enterprise. Support the establishment and/or strengthening of leadership structures of the cooperatives through focussed topics on leadership and group dynamics for cooperative leaders and SPRODETA field staff.
• Support the cooperatives review or develop group constitutions which clearly stipulate the rules of engagement, roles and responsibilities of group leaders and members, and clearly define the grievance redress mechanisms amongst members.
• Ensure all activities are done in collaboration with at least one of SPRODETA Agribusiness’s staff for knowledge transfer and further technical training and backstopping for the cooperatives.

5. DELIVERABLES

The following are the required deliverables under this assignment:

• Submission of the inception report outlining the assignment delivery methodology and approach and detailing the delivery schedule for all tasks planned under the
• Delivery of a rapid capacity needs assessment report, clearly highlighting identified capacity needs
• Delivery of the training manuals on cooperative management that include a simplified translated version (Tumbuka/ Chichewa) to ensure ease of cascading the knowledge and skills to other cooperative members who may not be part of this training.
• Submission of the backstopping training delivery and monitoring plan for trainer of trainers (ToTs).
• Delivery of the training report, including list of the trainers of trainers and members trained.
• Monthly timesheet after completion of every month, within 10 days of the following month.
• Other deliverables as per the needs of the project partners as determined by CASA Country Team.

The indicative delivery timelines are summarised in the table below. The final allocation of days will be agreed between the consultant and CASA team, in liaison with the client.

 Deliverable Timelines

6. DURATION

The assignment is expected to take 20 workdays in September 2024.

 7. QUALITY ASSURANCE

 CASA and the project partner will be responsible for assuring the quality of the training materials to ensure that the information given is reliable and sufficient to guide technical backstopping to SPRODETA Agribusiness’s team and practical implementation of cooperative management among small-scale producers, and that any potential limitations of information given is clearly highlighted. The CASA Country team and SPRODETA will discuss and agree the expected criteria for quality with the successful applicant and will oversee the quality of each deliverable.

8. REQUIREMENTS and EXPERTISE

• Demonstrated track-record in farmer engagement, training and mobilisation for development activities.
• Experience in farmer organisation development, or extension service provision, especially in agro-based businesses.
• Practical knowledge and ability to innovate and adapt production systems from purely subsistence to commercially oriented
• Excellent organizational and time management skills.
• Adeptness and practical application of CASA’s crosscutting themes of gender equality and social inclusion; climate change and environment; and food and nutrition security in contract farming arrangements.
• Excellent written and oral communication, listening and interpersonal skills with the ability to deal tactfully and diplomatically with a wide range of people combined with an appreciation of the importance of confidentiality.
• Willingness to take on new assignments at short notice and to travel frequently to remote areas.
• Ability to make decisions regarding own work, often in ambiguous situations and suggest recommendations regarding own function/discipline.
• Ability to function with minimum guidance and under pre-set procedures with attention to detail.
• Ability to exercise independent judgment within defined policies and practices.

9. MODE OF APPLICATION

Interested candidates should send an Expression of Interest no more than 9 pages long (in one document) broken down as follows;

1. A maximum of 2 pages EOI submission letter providing an overview of the candidate’s suitability for the role as per the terms of reference and their preferred daily rate expressed in GBP.

   Indicate your availability to carry out the assignment in September 2024.

2. A maximum of 4 pages outlining a proposed methodology according to their understanding of the assignment and its requirements.
3. A maximum of 3 pages Curriculum Vitae/Resume outlining only the relevant qualifications, experience and attributes for the role. Emphasis should be placed on similar consultancy assignments carried out by the candidate in the past 7 years.

Applications to be sent to rhch@niras.com with title of the position being applied for in the subject line by 16^thAugust 2024. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis and will accept the first suitable