Summary Report (MTE Report, Volume 1)

Mid-Term Evaluation (MTE) of the SAPLING Project

A USAID-funded Title II Development Food Security Activity implemented by HKI Bangladesh Award Number: AID-FFP-A-15-00010

17 April 2019 (Final)

Toymu GRAUS Acknowledgement

The members of the MTE team would like to gratefully acknowledge the support provided by the staff of the SAPLING Project. Special thanks go to Treena Bishop, SAPLING Chief of Party, Rozena Begum, the Director for Monitoring & Evaluation for SAPLING, and Mazibur Rahman, Senior Manager for Coordination, for their diligent support throughout the MTE process. We also want to thank all of the field staff from HKI, CRS, Caritas and the implementing partners, GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong, who went out of their way to provide logistical support to enable the team to implement an intensive schedule over a relatively short period. We also greatly appreciated their participating in various events during the evaluation and for providing frank insights while answering our questions. Innumerable program participants and beneficiaries have also provided useful responses and participated in stimulating discussions, and our gratitude goes out to them as well. Hopefully we've listened well, our observations are grounded in reality, our assessment is accurate, and our recommendations will be useful.

Sincerely,

Mike DeVries, Independent Consultant (Team Leader) Suzanne Nelson, TANGO Sadia Afroze Chowdhury, Independent Consultant Golam Kabir, Independent Consultant

Cover pictures taken by Suzanne Nelson (left) and Sadia Chowdhury (right)

This report was made public by support from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The authors’ views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the Government of the United States of America.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Page I. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1 II. BACKGROUND INFORMATION 3 A. Overview of the SAPLING Project 3 B. Project History & Context 5 C. MTE Methodology 7 D. Structure of the Report 9 III. SUMMARY OF PROJECT PROGRESS 10 A. Purpose 1: Income & Access to Food 10 B. Purpose 2: Maternal and Child Health and Nutrition 16 C. Purpose 3: Mitigating, Adapting To and Recovering From Shocks 22 D. Cross-Cutting Themes: Gender Equality and Social Inclusion, Targeting of Youth, Addressing Environmental Risks and Local Capacity Building 27 E. Theory of Change, Logical Framework & Targeting 31 F. Implementation Systems 34 IV. MAJOR THEMES FOR THE REMAINING LIFE OF SAPLING 40 A. THEME A: Strategic Thinking 41 B. THEME B: Implementation Quality 45 C. THEME C: Organizational Structure 52 D. THEME D: Planning and Budgeting 55 V. HIGHER LEVEL OBSERVATIONS – PROJECT SCOPE 57 VI. CONCLUDING REMARKS 57 ANNEXES Annex A: Prioritized List of Recommendations Organized by Theme 58 Annex B: Other Recommendations Generated by the MTE 61 Annex C: Finance, Monetization and Other Tables 69 Annex D: Upazila Reorganization Structure 71 MTE REPORT, VOLUME II, Contains the Initial Scope of Work for the SAPLING MTE, the MTE Protocol and Persons Interviewed and Sites Visited for Data Collection TABLES AND FIGURES Table 1. Goal, Purpose and Sub-Purposes for the SAPLING Project 3 Table 2. Characteristics of Sites Selected for the MTE data Collection 8 Table 3. Participants and Groups in the SAPLING Project Under Purpose 1 10 Table 4. Participants and Groups in the SAPLING Project Under Purpose 2 16 Table 5. Purpose 3 Approaches for Different Geographic Areas in SAPLING 23 Table 6. Participants and Groups in the SAPLING Project Under Purpose 3 24 Table 7. Participation of Adolescents and Youth in Project Activities 29 Table 8. Partner Roles in Implementing the SAPLING Project 36 Table 9. Performance Indicators in SAPLING 37

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ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS ACI Advanced Chemical Industries BHDC Bandarban Hill District Council BDRCS Bangladesh Red Crescent Society CDRT Community Disaster Response Team CHSW Community Health Service Worker CHT Chittagong Hill Tracts CHTRC Chittagong Hill Tracts Regional Council CoP Chief of Party CRA Community Risk Assessment CRS Catholic Relief Services CSBA Community Skilled Birth Attendant CHSW Community Health Service Worker DAE Department of Agriculture Extension DAP Detailed Activity Plan DFSA Development Food Security Activity DMC Disaster Management Committee DPHE Department of Public Health Engineering DRM Disaster Risk Management EBF Exclusive Breast Feeding EHA Essential Hygiene Actions EIBF Early Initiated Breast Feeding EMMP Environmental Monitoring and Mitigation Plan ENA Essential Nutrition Actions FF Field Facilitator FFP Food for Peace FIC Field Implementation Coordinator FMB Forest Management Brigade FSCD Fire Service and Civil Defense GESI Gender Equity and Social Inclusion GMP Growth Monitoring and Promotion GoB Government of Bangladesh HCA Host Country Agreement HKI Helen Keller International IEE Initial Environmental Examination IEHFP Integrated Enhanced Homestead Food Production IGA Income-Generating Activity IP Implementing Partner LC Learning Center LoA Life of Activity or Life of Award M&E Monitoring and Evaluation MC Marketing Committee MCHN Maternal and Child Health and Nutrition MFI Micro-Finance Institution MoCHTA Ministry of Chittagong Hill Tracts Affairs MoHFW Ministry of Health and Family Welfare

MT Metric Ton MTE Mid-Term Evaluation NGO Non-Governmental Organization PLW Pregnant and Lactating Women RCYV Red Crescent Youth Volunteer RFA Request for Applications RRAP Risk Reduction Action Plan SAPLING Sustainable Agriculture Production Linked to Improved Nutrition Status, Resilience and Gender Equity SILC Savings and Internal Lending Communities TANGO Technical Assistance to NGOs TBA Traditional Birth Attendant TBD To Be Determined TO Technical Officer ToC Theory of Change UDMC Union Disaster Management Committee WASH Water, Sanitation and Hygiene WATSAN Water and Sanitation WUC Water Users Committee

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

SAPLING Mid-Term Evaluation SUMMARY REPORT

I. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY HKI commissioned a Mid-Term Evaluation (MTE) of the SAPLING1 Project to formulate recommendations for the remaining life of the project to increase effectiveness in achieving sustainable impact and increase efficiency in use of resources. The MTE was planned and implemented over the period from mid-June through mid-December, 2018, with information gathering and preliminary analysis undertaken in Bangladesh from September 10 through October 9. The SAPLING Project is being implemented in 1579 paras2 in 24 unions and 2 pouroshavas3 in 5 upazilas in Bandarban District, one of the three districts located in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) of southeastern Bangladesh. The goal of the project is to achieve improved gender-equitable food security, nutrition and resilience for vulnerable people living in the CHT Region of Bangladesh. The project is specifically targeting (a) all households regardless of economic status with pregnant or lactating women with children under two years of age, (b) all poor and extreme poor households, adolescent girls, elderly, disabled, and female-headed households, and all adolescents for youth action and learning groups. Between 50,000 and 55,000 households are expected to benefit directly from the project. The overall program value4 is US$ 28,777,000, and a total of 57,290 Metric Tons (MTs) of commodities have already been monetized for the project. The current project life is from 30 September 2015 through 29 September 2020. Discussions are underway, however, for a limited cost, two-year extension of the project. The SAPLING Project has had a difficult start-up. Difficulty finalizing the host country agreement with the Ministry of Chittagong Hill Tracts Affairs (MoCHTA) led to a delay in receiving monetization funds. Suspension of project activities by the CHT Regional Council (CHTRC) in May 2016 forced a transition to a different implementation model. Part of this transition involved identification of five local implementing partners from Bandarban, and further delays were incurred in obtaining approvals from the CHTRC for the five partners who were selected by the project as a result of fairly rigorous selection process. Ultimately, only three partners were approved by the CHTRC, and the five upazilas have been allocated to these partners. The project is unusual for Bangladesh in that it has to deal with multiple authorities in a post-conflict setting. These include the MoCHTA for the Government of Bangladesh (GoB), the CHTRC and Bandarban Hill District Council (BHDC) for NGO Coordination in the CHT, local traditional authorities including headmen and karbari (a para chief), who control access to paras, and the Ministry of Home Affairs for security clearance for international staff and visitors. Because of the delays in start-up and having to undergo two transitions in the implementing strategy, SAPLING is significantly behind the original plans for implementation. It has actually only really been in the last six months that the project has geared up to full implementation. It is a bit early in the implementation process to fully assess the effectiveness of project approaches. It is very apparent, however, that more attention needs to be given generally to ensuring the sustainability of the impact that is likely to be achieved. The MTE identified four major themes for SAPLING as a priority focus in its remaining life, including the two-year limited cost extension, and has formulated fourteen high priority recommendations in support

1 Sustainable Agriculture Production Linked to Improved Nutrition Status, Resilience and Gender Equity (SAPLING) 2 In the CHT, a para is a cluster of households in rural areas that is like a small village. Paras also exist in the plain lands as a subdivision of a village. 3 A pouroshava is a local government body in a city or town, also known as a municipality. 4 Includes cash resources as well as the Cost & Freight value of monetized food from FFP

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 of these themes. One of these themes is to focus on thinking strategically. Although most of the project’s approaches are still relatively untested given the short implementation period, there are some critical areas that need more strategic thinking now to adapt the SAPLING strategy to the CHT context or to revise strategic approaches to ensure impact. The project also needs to think more deliberately about sustaining outcomes and impact. Under this theme, the MTE has proposed three recommendations including contextualizing the SAPLING strategy to the remote highland areas, revising and expanding the IGA component of the project and thinking more strategically about how the project can put in place the key elements required to ensure sustainable impact. The second theme is to focus on implementation quality. There are some approaches being implemented by SAPLING that need significant attention now to become more effective in achieving outcomes and impact. Recommendations under this theme include expanding and accelerating the focus on marketing, replacing input distributions with conditional cash transfers, streamlining and focus the messages in the Food and Income component (Purpose 1) of the project, strengthening the capacities of the CHSWs under the MCHN component (Purpose 2), putting in place sustainable services for WASH hardware maintenance and repair, reviewing the quality of and revising implementation plans for the Nurturing Connections component, and building capacities of Union Disaster Management Committees (UDMCs) to mobilize resources to support implementation of their Risk Reduction Action Plans (RRAPs). The third theme relates to organizational structure, or how the project has been organized to deliver project interventions. The current structure is a function of the transitions that SAPLING has undergone up to now. With the two-year extension that is being considered, there is time to undertake another transition that will enable the project to address inefficiencies in project planning and monitoring, as well as some partner relations issues. The MTE has identified two specific recommendations in support of this theme. One of these is to create and fill a position in Bandarban District for a District Coordinator to oversee program quality, facilitate project coordination, and represent the project with local authorities. The second recommendation is to restructure the project at the upazila level to give more responsibilities to implementing partners and to add positions to stream-line planning, improve decision-making, and facilitate expanded technical support for the front- lines. The fourth theme is to refine the implementation planning and budgeting systems to make the former more complete and to synchronize budgeting with planning and the revised organizational structure. The MTE identified two priority recommendations. One of these is to improve the effectiveness of the Detailed Action Plan (DAP) tool and the other is to reallocate budgets at the Upazila level to conform with the revised organizational structure. This will also align the budget more closely with activity planning. In addition to the fourteen priority recommendations, Annex B to this report provides additional observations followed by relevant recommendations generated by the MTE that did not make the short- list of prioritized recommendations. These are still useful, however, for improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the project. The MTE also identified two sets of observations that go beyond the scope of the SAPLING Project but may be important to be brought to the attention of Food for Peace (FFP) and HKI since they may have relevance for future programming. One of these includes demanding less often that project proposals be designed to address the full range of food insecurity, nutrition and resilience for all types of vulnerable households. This would allow some projects to be more focused on, in the case of SAPLING, for example, preventing child malnutrition targeting households with pregnant and lactating women. The second area discusses the challenges faced by the project’s monitoring and evaluation systems with the volume of indicators that are required for Title II projects.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

The SAPLING Project has made good progress in getting fully underway in the last year. There would be substantial concern if the project had only two years remaining in its life, and the priority recommendations would have focused more on scaling back on the range of activities and reducing targets. With the two-year extension extending the project life to four years from now, however, there is time to complete the approaches that have been planned, if at least half of the extension period can be used for completing implementation. In the coming period, the project should focus on contextualizing the SAPLING strategy, thinking more rigorously about sustainable impact, refining implementation approaches to align with current best practice, and restructuring project delivery to increase planning and monitoring effectiveness. II. BACKGROUND INFORMATION A. Overview of the SAPLING Project The goal of the SAPLING Project is to achieve improved gender equitable food security, nutrition and resilience of vulnerable people living in the CHT Region of Bangladesh. The project is specifically targeting (a) all households with pregnant and/or lactating women (PLW), (b) all households with children under two years of age, (c) all poor and extreme poor households, and (d) all adolescent girls, elderly persons, disabled persons, and female-headed households. The estimated project value5 is USD 28,777,000, and a total of 57,290 MTs of commodities was approved and has been monetization for the project. There is no direct distribution of commodities in the SAPLING Project. Under the leadership of Helen Keller International (HKI), the SAPLING Project is being implemented by a consortium composed of Catholic Relief Services (CRS) and Caritas Bangladesh working in partnership with three local implementing partners, including Tahzingdong, Toymu, and GRAUS, and one technical partner, the WorldFish Center. The project anticipates having impact on approximately 55,000 households in 1579 paras in 24 unions and 2 pouroshavas in 5 upazilas in Bandarban District in the CHT as shown in the map on the following page. Table 1 shows the current Goal, Purposes and Sub-Purposes for the project. Table 1: Goal, Purposes and Sub-Purposes for the SAPLING Project GOAL: Improved gender-equitable food security, nutrition and resilience of vulnerable people in the CHT Region of Bangladesh Purpose 1: Increased income and access to nutritious foods attained equitably by both women and men Sub-Purpose 1.1: Increased sales and profitability from income generating activities Sub-Purpose 1.2: Increased homestead (IGAs)/markets agriculture production of nutritious foods Purpose 2: Improved nutritional status of children under five years of age (C<5), pregnant and lactating women (PLW) and adolescent girls Sub-Purpose 2.2: Improved health of Sub-Purpose 2.1: Adequate and equitable household members, especially pregnant and distribution and consumption of safe and diverse lactating women, adolescent girls, and children nutritious foods in households under five Purpose 3: Sustained gender-equitable ability of people, households, communities, and systems to mitigate, adapt to and recover from human-induced and natural shocks and stresses Sub-Purpose 3.2: Sub-Purpose 3.2: Sub-Purpose 3.1: Increased gender-equitable Strengthened Strengthened local resilience strategies for target populations and communities to mitigate government disaster households, enabling them to protect their lives and recover from human- risk reduction and and livelihoods from human-induced and natural induced and natural disaster recovery shocks and stresses. shocks and stresses systems

5 Includes cash resources as well as the Cost & Freight value of monetized food from FFP.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

1. Purpose 1: Income & Food Production. Under this component, the SAPLING Project is implementing three interventions focused on homestead food production, income-generating activities (IGAs), and access to capital from a community-managed loan fund. The Purpose 1 strategy targets an estimated 51,000 households in the project area, including all poor or extreme poor households as well as other non-poor households with pregnant or lactating women. A representative from each of these households is targeted for participation in homestead food production activities. A total of 10,000 individuals are also targeted for IGA activities, and 504 Savings and Internal Lending Community (SILC) groups with between ten and twenty members are targeted for access to capital interventions. Although the majority of IGA and SILC participants are from targeted households, IGA participants also include input retailers, WASH entrepreneurs, coffee farmers, and livestock health workers, who are not required to be from the project’s impact groups. The SILC intervention is also open to anyone who is interested, so the groups include members who are from non-poor households. 2. Purpose 2: Maternal and Child Health and Nutrition. Under this component, the SAPLING Project is implementing five major interventions to improve nutritional status of children under five years of age, pregnant and lactating women, and adolescent girls. These include social and behavioral change communication around nutrition and hygiene, capacity-building of GoB and non-government health service providers, implementation of a gender transformational approach called “Nurturing Connections”, capacity building on nutrition in emergencies, and institutional strengthening for improved water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) infrastructure and behavior. All pregnant and lactating women with children under two are targeted under this component of the project, and over the LoA, it is expected that 10,824 PLW women will have participated. 3. Purpose 3: Absorb, Adapt to and Recover from Shocks. Consistent with the Sendai Framework6 for Disaster Risk Reduction, the SAPLING Project is implementing eight types of interventions to enable people, households, communities and systems to mitigate, adapt to and recover from human-induced and natural shocks and stresses. These interventions include building the capacities of Disaster Management Committees (DMCs) to use community risk assessment (CRA) tools to develop Risk Reduction Action Plans (RRAPs), building household capacities for disaster risk preparedness planning,

6 www.unisdr.org/we/coordinate/sendai-framework

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 building capacities of Red Crescent volunteers and community disaster response teams (CDRTs), working with the GoB Fire Service and Civil Defense (FSCD) to establish urban community disaster volunteers, working with selected schools to establish forest management brigades (FMB), facilitating access to GoB safety nets for eligible households and building community awareness on disaster risk management. The project has identified eleven unions as being most vulnerable to disasters and activities under Purpose 3 are concentrated in these eleven unions. 6. Cross-Cutting Themes. The SAPLING Project has four cross-cutting themes, including promoting gender equity and social inclusion, targeting youth, addressing sources of environmental risk, and local capacity building. The latter includes a set of interventions that fall outside of the project’s Theory of Change, but are important for long term development in the CHT. B. Project History & Context 1. Project History. The SAPLING Project has had a difficult start-up. The first delay occurred in finalizing the host country agreement (HCA) with MoCHTA. While SAPLING is not the first Title II project to be implemented in the CHT7, it has been many years since the last projects were implemented, and some of the concepts associated with Title II were new to the current staff in MoCHTA. The idea of monetization, in particular, took a long time to explain to various departments reviewing the HCA. Until the HCA was signed, SAPLING could not establish working relationships within Bandarban District. Project activities, including selecting participants, conducting formative research/assessments, or recruiting local implementing partners, could not be started; and as an expatriate, the CoP was also not allowed to travel to Bandarban until after the HCA was signed. The HCA was finally approved on 30 June 2016 and the official signing ceremony was held on 16 July 2016, making it possible to move forward with full implementation. The primary funding for supporting project implementation is monetization proceeds from the sale of wheat to the GoB8. The first call forward for monetization commodities with provisional approval of MoCHTA was initiated shortly after the signing of the cooperative agreement between HKI and USAID, and the first shipment of commodities arrived in late January 2016. The first payment of monetization proceeds, however, was not received until mid-December 2016, almost 15 months after the signing of the cooperative agreement to start the project. An interim funding arrangement was made for the project in April 2016 by USAID via a modification to the cooperative agreement that authorized the transfer of $690,018 of unspent monetization funds from the PROSHAR Project that was implemented by ACDI/VOCA in the previous cycle. The HCA approval and transfer of funds from PROSHAR made it possible to begin full startup of the project in July 2016, nine months after the signing of the cooperative agreement. When the SAPLING Project was designed, the project delivery plan had assigned responsibility to Caritas for implementing the project in three upazilas and a local partner would be recruited after the signing of the HCA to implement in the other two upazilas. This type of structure was not uncommon at the time. Government policies for the CHT stipulate that local NGOs must implement project activities. Caritas’ project experience in the CHT up to the time that SAPLING was designed had met this condition with some, but not all, implementation being done by local partners from the CHT. It was assumed that the same approach would be acceptable for SAPLING. In late May, 2016, however, the CHTRC which oversees NGOs operating in the CHT much like the NGO Affairs Bureau oversees NGOs in the rest of the country, demanded that SAPLING suspend implementation based on the observation that the project was not complying with the condition that local NGOs must implement project activities. After negotiations which resulted in two major

7 Both CARE and World Vision have implemented Title II-funded projects in the CHT. 8 This is not a new monetization arrangement in Bangladesh, since CARE and other NGOs have been selling Title II commodities to the GoB for decades.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 conditions that (a) Caritas could not directly implement in the field and (b) SAPLING would select five local organizations as implementing partners (one per upazila), the project was allowed to resume in mid-July 2016. The project could not return to full implementation, however, but focused on implementing a process to select local NGOs and revising partner roles, especially for Caritas. In December 2016, the selection process for local implementing partners was completed, and the list of five partners was submitted to MoCHTA and the CHTRC. The former approved all five, but the latter approved only three of the five and proposed their own alternatives for the remaining two slots. In April 2017, the three approved NGOs, GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong, signed implementing agreements with the project. For the other two open slots for NGOs, the project was at an impasse. The two organizations proposed by the CHTRC had not passed the SAPLING vetting process, and the CHTRC was not going to approve any other NGOs. The stalemate was not resolved until April 2018, a year later, when agreement was finally reached to assign the remaining two upazilas to the three approved partners. The bottom-line for SAPLING is that even though project start-up was officially 30 September 2015, the project was not positioned for full implementation with all partners and all upazilas covered until April, 2018. 2. Unique Features in the Bandarban Context. The CHT can be reviewed as a post-conflict setting. Even though the Peace Agreement was negotiated in 1997, there are still significant tensions between ethnic groups and the GoB maintains tight control over entry into the region and political activities. Unlike other parts of Bangladesh, multiple authorities are responsible for governing the region. MoCHTA represents the GoB in the CHT. The CHTRC is responsible for the coordination of NGOs working in the CHT, but they also take very seriously their mandate to support the peoples of the CHT. The BHDC acts as managing entity at the Bandarban District level under the CHTRC. Traditional leaders including headmen and karbari control access to communities, and government officials hold influential roles with varying levels of authority. The Bangladesh Army has a pervasive presence in the CHT, and the Ministry of Home Affairs is responsible for security in the region. Projects operating in the CHT have to operate under all of these authorities, some of which can be very difficult, i.e., advocating for their own interests rather than being objective in supporting development. The CHT is a region of great cultural diversity. In Bandarban District where SAPLING operates, there are twelve ethnic groups and no common language. Bengali is widely spoken by the more educated residents, but very few of the poor and extreme poor speak Bengali, although as many as 75% may understand Chittagonian. While there is some geographical distinction between groups, i.e., pockets which are of a single ethnic group, there are paras that have multiple groups as well as paras near each other who speak different languages. The CHT in general is highly underdeveloped relative to the rest of Bangladesh. There is poor infrastructure – electricity, roads, and cell phones/internet – especially in the more remote areas. Basic services are also underdeveloped and highly understaffed, since the CHT is not considered a comfortable place to work by government staff from the plain lands. In terms of remoteness, almost 10% of the paras participating in SAPLING require 6 hours or more of travel time one-way from the upazila headquarters, and another 36% require 2 to 6 hours of travel time. SAPLING has been criticized by the CHTRC and the BDHC for not recruiting enough staff from the CHT or from smaller ethnic groups. The project has a strong commitment to doing so, but it is also accountable for producing results. The pool of staff from the CHT with relevant experience for a Title II project is small, and significant time and resources are required to train staff at all levels. The terrain in the CHT is very different from the plain lands. While cyclones, floods and river erosion are common in the plain lands, the types of shocks in the CHT are different, i.e., landslides, flash floods and wild animal attacks. Personal safety and security issues are also greater in the CHT. These risks can be associated with kidnapping or harm by “insurgents”, Myanmar border incursions, accidents on

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 winding roads, animal attacks and landslides. DRR approaches, including early warning, need to be adapted to these different types of covariate and idiosyncratic emergencies. C. MTE Methodology 1. Purpose of the MTE. The SAPLING MTE was a formative evaluation intended to review the progress of the project in producing planned outputs, to assess the intended and unintended effects of these outputs, and to examine the quality of various processes being used to implement the project to formulate recommendations to be implemented in the remaining life of the project. These recommendations are oriented around (a) scaling up effective interventions, (b) modifying interventions to improve effectiveness, (c) suspending interventions that are not effective enough relative to investment, (d) piloting new interventions relevant for targeted impact groups, (e) improving the effectiveness of implementation systems, or (f) improving efficiency in use of resources. The evaluation process prioritized recommendations and ensured as much as possible that they are implementable within the time frame remaining and with the resources available for the program. Based on advice from both USAID Bangladesh and HKI, the time frame considered in developing the recommendations included the two-year limited cost extension that is currently being discussed. The discussions were not finalized by the time the MTE was completed, so under each of the priority recommendations, the MTE has made suggestions on what to do with the recommendation if the two-year extension is not approved. Investigations during the MTE focused on (a) assessing the impact of SAPLING interventions to date, projected impact to project end, and their sustainability beyond the life of the project; (b) reviewing the SAPLING Theory of Change and Logical Framework and assessing the extent to which the activities being implemented accurately reflect the TOC and LF and the extent to which there is evidence that the hypotheses articulated in the TOC and LF are holding true; (c) evaluating the functions, efficiency and quality of partnerships between all implementing and technical partners, and SAPLING’s engagement with traditional institutions, district and regional councils, local government officials, and other relevant development actors, (d) reviewing and assessing the processes in place for capturing and documenting lessons learned and assessing the extent to which they are used in project implementation and refining project design; (e) determining the appropriateness and effectiveness of strategies to support cross- cutting objectives relating to gender, youth and environmental risk, and (f) assessing and making recommendations for adjustments to resource allocation, and management structures that will increase the likelihood of SAPLING achieving desired outcomes and targets by project end. 2. MTE Team. The SAPLING MTE was implemented by a team fielded by TANGO International which included an independent consultant MTE Team leader, one full-time staff member from TANGO, and two independent technical specialist consultants9. The MTE Protocol in the MTE Report, Volume II, contains more background on the team as well as details on assigned responsibilities for each team member. 3. MTE Schedule and Process. The MTE was undertaken in three phases: → Phase 1: Evaluation Preparation (Mid-June through 9 September 2018) → Phase 2 (in Bangladesh): Data Collection & Preliminary Analysis (10 September through 9 October 2018) → Phase 3: Evaluation Recommendations Finalization (10 October through 15 December 2018)

9 Mike DeVries (Team Leader & Independent Consultant), Suzanne Nelson (TANGO), Sadia Afroz Chowdhury (Independent Consultant), and Golam Kabir (Independent Consultant).

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

Actual implementation schedules, including the full schedule for the MTE as well as the field schedule for data collection, are provided in the MTE Report, Volume II. Details on the various activities undertaken in each phase are also provided in Volume II. Qualitative methods, including key informant interviews, focus group discussions, and activity observations, were used to gather information from a variety of sources at multiple levels. → Interviews were held with implementing and technical support staff and project stakeholders based in Dhaka → Interviews were held with project implementing staff and stakeholders in Bandarban District → Interviews were held with project implementing staff and stakeholders in each of the five upazilas. → Interviews or focus group discussions were held in 21 paras in twelve unions and one pouroshava with project participants and community leaders. Table 2 summarizes the mix of paras visited for data collection relative to the selection criteria that were used, including accessibility and performance. In addition, the MTE selected locations proportional to the ethnic groups who are participating in the project. Of the twenty-one paras visited, six were Marma paras, five were Bengali, three were Tripura, three were Mro, one was Khumi, one was Tanchangya and two were mixed ethnic groups, i.e., Bengali and a tribal group. Table 2. Characteristics of Sites Selected for the MTE Data Collection

PERFORMANCE SAMPLE SELECTION CRITERIA10 Good Average Low TOTAL Easy (<30 minutes) 1 4 2 7 Moderate (30 to 90 minutes) 3 1 4 8 ACCESSIBILITY Remote (>90 minutes) 1 3 2 6 TOTAL 5 8 8 21

A total of 816 participants, implementing staff and representatives of project stakeholders were consulted by the MTE team in the interviews and focus group discussions described above. A detailed list of these respondents is provided in the MTE Report, Volume II. Major observations and preliminary recommendations were presented to SAPLING staff for verification and refinement in a two-day Verification Workshop to ensure that the observations reflected reality and the recommendations were relevant, realistic and achievable, given the resources and time available for the program. The MTE Team reviewed the full list of recommendations developed to this point and, based on information from the workshop11, as well as additional information from the project management team and the opinions of MTE team members, formulated a priority list of recommendations organized around major themes for the remaining life of the project. These were presented to the leadership of the organizations implementing SAPLING and finally to USAID Bangladesh representatives. 3. MTE Limitations. A number of limitations affected the quality of the MTE. Because of GoB approval requirements for field travel by expatriates in the CHT, the field schedule for the MTE had to be developed two months before the work was scheduled to commence. This schedule had to indicate not only the location or para but also the types of interviews and focus group discussions that would be

10 Details on the definition of these criteria are provided in the MTE Protocol in Volume II of this report. 11 A total of 65 recommendations were presented over the two days of the workshop. In the days immediately following the workshop, these were reduced through clustering and elimination to a list of 14 priority recommendations and 25 additional recommendations. The latter have been further refined and consolidated into the 22 recommendations provided in Annex B

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 held. Once approved, the schedule had to be followed in that no additional interviews or focus groups discussions could be held. The full MTE team had not assembled at the time the schedule needed to be developed, and some members of the team were engaged in other work during this period and therefore could not fully participate in site selection and identification of key informants or the types of focus groups to be organized. The schedule was developed basically by the SAPLING M&E Director from sites selected by the MTE Team Leader. Because it was not possible to deviate from the schedule, some key participants, e.g., participating retail traders, were inadvertently omitted from the schedule. All in all, however, the MTE team was able to conduct enough interviews and focus group discussions with key participants to generate a good picture for the project. As mentioned above, 46% of the paras participating in SAPLING require at least two hours of travel time from the Upazila headquarters. Due to time constraints and security policies by the GoB that required the team to travel only during the daylight hours, the MTE team was limited to visiting paras that were more accessible. The sample of paras visited only included six sites that could be considered representative of the somewhat remote areas where the project is working. Interviews with project staff were used to obtain information to understand what the project was doing in the more remote paras. During the field work in Bandarban, the two expatriates on the MTE were accompanied continuously by a security team provided by the GoB police force and usually one member of a non-uniformed internal security service. For the most part this team was unobtrusive, but there was at least one occasion in which one member of the MTE team had to cut short an interview at the request of security because, as they said, they only had one team of police officers to accompany the two expatriates, therefore the expatriates had to stay together12. The security team certainly monitored discussions, and apparently, were required to submit daily reports to their supervisors. In order to be close enough to hear the interviews/discussions, they were also close enough to influence answers from respondents. The approval letter provided by the Ministry of Home Affairs also clearly stipulated that the MTE team was not allowed to talk about politics or land issues. While the land issues came up often, the politics of the CHT came up rarely. The MTE team members diverted discussions, however, on the land discussions as per the approval letter from the GoB. All in all, the key informant interviews and focus group discussions were organized quite well for the MTE. The team rarely had to wait long for participants, group sizes were consistent with best practice, and respondents did not appear to have been coached before the interviews or discussions. D. Structure of the Report The report on the SAPLING MTE has been prepared in two volumes. Volume I (this document) is the MTE Summary Report which documents background information on the project and the MTE, a summary of project progress, a description of the fourteen priority recommendations organized around major themes, brief descriptions of some higher-level observations by the MTE team that go beyond the SAPLING Project, and brief concluding remarks. Annex A of the report contains a summary list of the priority recommendations. Annex B to this report provides additional observations followed by relevant recommendations generated by the MTE that did not make the list of prioritized recommendations. These are still useful, however, for improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the project. Volume II is the MTE Methodology Report which contains the Terms of Reference for the MTE, the MTE Protocol, and the full list of persons interviewed and sites observed for data collection in the MTE.

12 In fact, it was learned later that this was an excuse, not the reason. The actual reason was that security was uncomfortable with the way the interview was being conducted behind a closed door.

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III. SUMMARY OF PROJECT PROGRESS The following sections describe the main findings from the MTE on the progress of the SAPLING Project toward meeting output targets as well as the emerging outcomes that were observed. A. Purpose 1: Income & Access to Food The SAPLING Theory of Change (ToC) around Purpose 1 which targets increased equitable access to income and nutritious foods for both males and females suggests that sustainable improvements in on- farm production for both profit and home consumption and off-farm production for profit, stronger linkages to and involvement with markets, particularly for women, improved service provision, access to information, resources, and services, and strengthened social, financial, human, and physical capital leads to increased household income and access to nutritious foods. Broadly, the project utilizes three interrelated approaches to achieving this goal, namely homestead food production in an approach called Integrated and Enhanced Homestead Food production (IEHFP), income generation (IGA), and community-based saving and loan groups (SILC). Purpose I targets approximately 47,000 households in the SAPLING project area, including all poor or extremely poor households as well as households with pregnant or lactating women. Given the tremendous challenges and delays in start-up, most of the progress in Purpose 1 implementation occurred in FY2018, and in particular between April and September, 2018. The first half of FY2018 was primarily spent conducting assessments including a Value Chain and Market Governance Assessment, the Household Census for M&E, and Participatory Rural Appraisal as part of a Qualitative Research effort, developing training manuals including the IGA training modules, Training of Trainer modules, and IEHFP curriculum, and training staff. However, by the end of December 2017, 44,808 SAPLING participants were members of an IEHFP group, with 2,309 Learning Center leaders recruited. By the end of March 2018, 8,326 producers had been recruited for IGA groups, 604 participants for aquaculture activities, and a total of 317 SILC groups had formed. Table 3 summarizes the types of participants and groups engaged by SAPLING under Purpose 1. Table 3. Participants and Groups in the SAPLING Project under Purpose I

Current Membership/Sex LOA Type of Participant/Group Total Female Male Target Livestock Health Workers 56 7 49 IGA Group Aquaculture Participants 604 599 5 10,000 Participants Other IGA Participants 8,495 8,366 129 Marketing Committees 0 22 Marketing Collection Points 0 TBD Agro-Input Retailers 42 0 42 42 Youth Learning Corps Participants 65 32 33 60 IEHFP Group Participants 46,520 44,448 756 46,348 Learning Center Participants (LC leaders) 2,399 2,399 0 2,200 IEHFP Group Participants in Nurturing Connections 46,520 44,448 756 46,348 Men (Husbands) Participants in Nurturing 28,271 28,271 TBD Connections Senior Women Participants in Nurturing 8,575 8,575 TBD Connections (not IEHFP members) SILC Agents 60 31 29 60 SILC Groups 352 504 Poultry Recipients (PLWs) 2,088 2,088 0 10,824

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1. Integrated Enhanced Homestead Food Production. IEHFP is a cornerstone of the SAPLING project and the main platform for delivering program messages from all sectors, reinforcing learning, and strengthening resilience capacities at the household as well as community levels. Not only do IEHFP groups receive training on horticulture in, for example, bed preparation, row planting, spacing, mulching, composting, pest management; but the IEHFP curriculum was revised during the first quarter of FY2018 to include content on SAPLING’s gender transformative Nurturing Connections, other gender equality and social inclusion messages, nutrition, poultry, natural resource management, WASH, and disaster risk management (DRM). In interviews with IEHFP group members during the MTE, seed distributions dominated discussions. Most members “liked” the seed distributions, “…because seeds are free and we don’t have to buy them.” There was also widespread agreement that the seed distributions provided too little seed, i.e., did not produce enough extra to sell, low quality seeds with low germination, or the wrong types of seeds. The majority of FGD participants indicated that they did not like several of the SAPLING seed varieties, in part because they had low market value. In particular, longer-fruited cucumbers and bitter gourds are preferred over the shorter, smaller-fruited counterparts provided through SAPLING’s seed distributions. There was some suggestion that red amaranth was problematic for some SAPLING participants because it was perceived to resemble human blood, though this may be more idiosyncratic than widespread. Although HKI consulted with local Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) management and farmers’ leaders regarding seed quantity, procured seed from a nationally reputed source, and selected varieties based on nutritional value, existing consumption patterns, and appropriateness (e.g., good for a short growing season), FGD participants were, for the most part, not particularly satisfied with quantity, quality or choice of seed provided by the project. During the second quarter of FY2018, SAPLING revised its seed distribution strategy based on input from Bottle Gourd in a Homestead Garden participants, i.e., they either received too few seeds or too many relative to the amount of land they could access). Consequently, two levels of seed distributions were developed, consisting of either seven or four varieties of seeds. Learning Center (LC) leaders were provided with additional seed varieties, including eggplant, tomato, papaya, and cabbage, with the expectation they would make available to IEHFP group members 50% of the seed and production produced in the learning center, while keeping 50% for themselves. Though not widespread, some group members who were interviewed during the MTE suggested that some tension develops as a result of the LC leaders getting more and different types of seed than everyone else in the group. 2. Learning Center Leaders. Originally, SAPLING’s IEHFP intervention was modeled on the Village Model Farmers approach developed by HKI, where lead farmers are first intensively trained and then expected to train group members. When the IEHFP curriculum was revised, the model also changed slightly. IEHFP sessions would instead be conducted with all group members rather than a lead farmer, but SAPLING would also invest in building the capacities of LC leaders to provide extension services to her group members. That is, the SAPLING TOC expects that LC leaders serve as a type of community- based agricultural extension or resource person. This is accomplished not only by training leaders in adult education methods and leadership skills, but by supporting establishment of a LC, or space for learning by doing, as well as observation, and at which the LC leader provides services and support. Thus, the expected outcome is that households will have increased access to improved agricultural inputs and services, local technical support, and agricultural extension services through the LC leader.

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According to data presented to the MTE Team, 1,093 Learning Learning Center & Learning Center Leader Centers had been established as of August 31, 2018. However, no leadership training sessions had occurred, and only 31 LC leaders in Lama Upazila had received any technical training. Interviews conducted with IEHFP group members, FFs, and LC leaders revealed that LCs were often very difficult to establish, most notably because homesteads lacked sufficient space to conduct demonstrations, except in Lama which is generally more similar to plain lands. In addition, most households indicated that they cultivate vegetables in their jhum, which is not always conveniently located and often requires walking long distances. In some cases, the project has established LCs near the jhum. It should also be noted that because of such challenges, not all paras had established LCs, rather multiple paras might be clustered around a single LC. Although the MTE Team was not able to interview many LC leaders, interviews with IEHFP groups suggest that, despite orientations regarding LC functions and responsibilities of LC leaders not all members had a clear concept of a LC leader and what role she is supposed to play within the group, and more broadly within the community, in terms of service provision and leadership. This may be due, at least in part, to the fact that the leadership and technical training for LC leaders had not yet been completed by the project. 3. Income-Generating activities (IGA). According to the FY2017 Annual Results Report, IGA groups were not Harvested Production From a Pumpkin IGA formed until the fourth quarter in FY 2017, and it was only in the first quarter of FY2018 by December, 2017, that SAPLING finalized the six sub-sectors for their IGA activities, replacing eggplant and pineapple with pumpkin and turmeric as high-value commercial crops. The sub-sector research also suggested that the project should support several smaller ventures, including livestock health workers, WASH entrepreneurs, input sellers, and mushroom, poultry, and coffee producers. Technical training modules were produced for the six sub-sectors which are ginger, turmeric, papaya, pumpkin, banana, livestock health workers and WASH, as well as business training modules for IGA participants and Training of Trainer modules for staff. IGA groups received their first training sessions during the third quarter of FY2018 (April – June). Field Facilitators (FFs) conducted two out of four planned, four-hour training sessions on IGAs, including production, sales, planning, land preparation, planting, intercropping, and pre-harvesting. The MTE occurred during the month of September, less than three months after the training had been completed. Although there were 604 on-farm IGA groups and an additional 22 off-farm IGA groups as of the end of August 2018, very little in the way of asset transfers had occurred by the MTE. No IGA group participants interviewed as part of the MTE reported having received their input transfers or increased production or sales as a result of membership in a SAPLING IGA group. However, 421 papaya sub- sector participants, just under 20% of all papaya IGA participants, received 35 saplings each within the third quarter of FY2018. SAPLING’s Detailed Activity Plan (DAP) as of August 30, 2018 indicated that input support to on- and off-farm IGA participants occurred in Lama and Bandarban Upazilas only. In addition, across all five upazilas nearly 2,100 PLW from IEHFP groups had received poultry distributions as of the end of August 2018, most of which also occurred during the third quarter.

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4. Marketing Committees and Collection Points. In July 2018, SAPLING revised its Livelihoods Strategy to conform with the new FFP Food Assistance and Food Security Strategy which “promotes agriculture and livelihood activities that prepare more vulnerable, less market-ready individuals to improve their on- and off-farm livelihood activities by providing them with skills and capacities (“push”) to benefit from and engage in value chain activities that create demand (“pull”) for labor and smallholder producers, thereby linking them to market-driven actors (“push-pull” model).” Expected outputs include established linkages with market actors, input retailers trained on quality inputs and service provision, and availability of quality inputs and services for on- and off-farm production. The expected outcome is that market actors will have strengthened capacities to negotiate fair prices, provide and/or access market information, and utilize marketing mechanisms that are useful to both producers and other market actors in ways that favor poor and extreme poor producers. Achievement of the Purpose 1 goal, as well as SAPLING’s overall goal, relies heavily on a producer’s ability to market his/her goods. SAPLING’s push and pull strategies involve technical improvements to increase production as well as creating stronger linkages between producers and market actors of both inputs and outputs, as well as with service providers. Marketing Committees (MC) play a key role in SAPLING’s marketing strategy, which promotes group marketing and sales activities. Based on HKI’s experience with the Making Markets Work for Women Project in the CHT, SAPLING’s MCs support both IEHFP and IGA “producer groups” by strengthening linkages with input sellers, output buyers, micro-finance institutions and other financial service providers, and technical experts. They also provide coaching on production and sales planning. The MCs are comprised of representatives from each of several producer groups. One person from an MC then acts as a Local Business Advisor, providing support and advice to producer groups on small business management, productivity and sustainability, and helps strengthen linkages between producer groups and public/private sector actors. As of the end of August 2018, no MCs had been formed, no MC meetings had occurred, no collection points had been established, and no meetings between MCs and market actors, government line departments, or financial service representatives had occurred. However, 616 out of a total target of 623 IGA group lead producers had been selected. Marketing Technical Officers (TOs) interviewed during the MTE expressed frustration with the lack of progress in terms of marketing activities. In particular, there was great concern about the failure of SAPLING to successfully fill the position of program manager for Markets & Value-Chains13, which had been vacant since May 2018. An “acting” manager was then brought on-board, only to resign after August. According to those interviewed during the MTE, the lack of strategic programmatic oversight has resulted in unnecessary delays in implementation and endangers the progress achieved to date with IGA groups. 5. Input Retailers. As part of SAPLING’s push-pull strategy, the project seeks to promote linkages between producers and agricultural input suppliers. By the end of FY2017, 42 agro-input dealers at both the union and upazila levels in Rowangchari, Lama, Ruma, and Bandarban Sadar had been identified and trained through the Agriculture Inputs Retailers’ Network established by USAID’s Feed the Future efforts. Training included business management, identification of quality seeds, identification of adulterated fertilizer, and safe and judicious use of agro-chemicals. Unfortunately, the MTE team was not able to conduct interviews with any of the agro-input dealers14. It was clear from other interviews, however, that access to inputs – both physical availability and affordability – are problematic in some parts of the SAPLING project area, particularly in more remote areas such as Ruma and Thanchi. Even in more accessible areas, certain inputs are in short supply, such as local poultry hatchlings and fish

13 The filling of this position has been delayed by the demand of the CHTRC to place their own person in the position. 14 The schedule for the field work was developed two months in advance in order to obtain GoB approvals, and visits to agro-input dealers were inadvertently left of the schedule and could not be added later.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 fingerlings. According to one fisheries TO in the project, the nearest fish feed retailers are in Chittagong which is a several-hour drive away from the project area, rather than the closer Cox’s Bazaar. Then project procured seed from two seed companies, ACI15 and Lal Teer, both of whom provided winter vegetable seeds in the first quarter of FY2018, and Lal Teer provided summer vegetable seeds in the second and third quarters. Although the union- and para-level seed distribution events are documented in SAPLING’s quarterly reports, it is difficult for the MTE team to determine how much relationship-building is actually happening between IEHFP or IGA group participants and input retailers, especially for non-seed agricultural inputs, at least at this time. No other input retailers are mentioned in any of SAPLING’s quarterly or annual reports available to the MTE team. Fish Pond 6. Aquaculture. As a pilot, aquaculture activities began during the second quarter of FY2018 (January – March 2018). Even then, implementation was heavily focused on training, including training of union- and upazila-level staff, field-level staff, and participants. Fingerlings were distributed to 398 fish pond and creek owners, including all 116 participants in Rowangchari but only 282 out of a targeted 488 participants in Lama. A total of 31 fish nurseries were also established, 27 in Lama and four in Rowangchari. Interviews conducted with fish pond owners, TOs, and FFs suggested that aquaculture activities are well-liked among participants and expectations are high, at least for the production and sale of fish. Open-water fisheries activities had not yet begun at the time of the MTE, although 150 fishermen from Rowangchari and Lama upazilas had been selected for training. In addition, acceptability trials for fish-based products which include fish chutney and fish powder had been, or were in the process of being, conducted, as well as follow-up discussions with taste testers at the para level in Rowangchari and Lama Upazilas. An acceptability trial for fish-based products targeted 100 PLW and key influential people such as husbands, in-laws, neighbors, and friends. Feedback from the trial was positive with 76% of those surveyed liking the chutney and 95% liking the fish powder. Distribution of fish-based products in a second trial targeted 115 PLWs and 100 children under 2 and was on-going at the time of the MTE. 7. Savings and Internal Lending Communities. According to SAPLING baseline data, only 23% of households in Bandarban reported cash savings at the time of the survey, and less than 4% reported using savings to help them recover from a shock or stress. SILC activities represent one of the three key approaches in Purpose 1 and strengthen household resilience in the face of shocks or stresses. Access to financial resources and productive assets were identified as critically lacking components in household resilience in the Bangladesh Resilience Research Report.16 A SILC group consists of self-identified members of a community who pool their savings into a fund from which members can borrow. The fund grows from interest paid on loans over the course of a pre- determined length of time, usually a cycle of 12 months. At the end of the cycle, the funds are distributed to members in a manner proportional to their savings. A separate social fund, or insurance, is managed for member emergencies, but bears no interest and is not distributed. According to the SILC guidelines, “the savings, insurance and loan facilities of SILCs allow members to meet their small, short- term financial needs for household cash-flow smoothing, income-generating activities, social obligations, and emergencies without having to borrow from a money lender, take an expensive advance from a

15 ACI stands for Advanced Chemical Industries, but the company generally uses just the abbreviation for identification. 16 Bangladesh Resilience Research Report: Final. 2017. Prepared by TANGO International, August 15, 2017.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 supplier, or rely on relatives.” In the SAPLING context, SILC capital should support and facilitate IGAs, and income earned from IGAs should support SILC savings. According to data provided to the MTE team, 344 SILC groups had been formed as of the time of the MTE, 333 of which were reported to be regularly saving and 188 were giving loans to members. Again, most of the progress accomplished as of the MTE occurred rather recently, and none of the groups has completed a cycle. Community mobilization meetings and recruitment of SILC agents were conducted during the first quarter of FY2018, along with the formation of 55 SILC groups. The majority of the SILC groups Members of a SILC Group were formed during the second quarter (January – March 2018), and by the end of June 2018, 248 SILC groups had completed all eight modules in the SILC training curriculum. According to FGDs with SILC group members, as well as interviews with SILC agents and TOs, SAPLING’s SILC activities have changed people’s behavior around saving. People now save money whereas they had not previously done so. In particular, group members indicated that they were saving to have money to use in case of future crises. Overall, group members were very enthusiastic about SILC and eagerly awaiting their first share-outs, indicating that they would use their money for productive investments such as leasing additional land, fencing, or purchasing livestock, to pay for school fees or religious ceremonies, and to help their husbands. At the MTE, at least one SILC group interviewed had already saved 26,000 BDT, while another reported that their group would be decreasing their monthly savings requirements from twice a month to once a month, with 20 BDT the minimum. Thus, for members of that group, putting away 40 BDT per month was not manageable. There was also some suggestion by interviewed SILC agents that people in more remote paras such as Remakri Union in Ruma Upazila and Tindu Union in Thanchi Upazila had a more difficult time and lack of interest in saving. According to the SILC agent interviews, both unions are fairly remote and difficult to access, contributing both to fewer market and income-generating opportunities (and therefore less household income) as well as less familiarity with saving and awareness of its benefits. Some paras chose not to participant in SILC, and within a para some community members did not want to join, making it a challenge to find at least ten people interested in participating. In the latter case, however, those individuals who were not interested at first are now clamoring for another group to form so that they can participate. The refusals by either paras or community members within a selected para to participate resulted in SILC agents needing to find alternative paras in order to accomplish group targets, or additional people in order to have the minimum number of members in a group. This occasionally resulted in a SILC agent working in a para that was not necessarily within their geographic implementation area, or a SILC group being made up of individuals from different paras. Both circumstances were problematic for SILC agents, primarily because forming a SILC group often entailed six to seven visits before a group was formed. In contrast, some paras wholeheartedly embraced SILC activities and have more than one SILC group. In still other areas, such as pouroshavas, some paras were purposively excluded by the project. This decision was based on the assumption that households in these paras would not be interested in SILC because they had access to other types of financial services from NGOs or micro-finance institutions (MFIs). However, MFIs and SILC groups provide very different products, suggesting that even where MFIs are available, SILC offers something not available through an MFI. Indeed, one of the benefits of SILC that group members acknowledged was its simplicity, that is, a minimum amount of bureaucracy, transparent transactions, and no required collateral for loans.

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B. Purpose 2: Maternal and Child Health and Nutrition The ToC for Purpose II which targets improving the nutritional status of children under five years of age, PLW and adolescent girls posits that, with an emphasis on the first 1000 days of life, the nutrition status can be improved if all household members increase adequate consumption of safe and diverse nutritious foods and are able to achieve better health. The pathways to achieve this are through increased knowledge and awareness of safe and nutritious food leading to improved nutrition, hygiene, and health care practices and care seeking behavior. SAPLING’s strategy for this behavior change (improved knowledge leading to practice) is through (i) training of Community Health Service Workers (CHSWs), FFs, Maternal and Child Health and Nutrition (MCHN) TOs; (ii) capacity-building of GoB and non-government health service providers and community-based providers such as village doctors, traditional birth attendants (TBAs) or community-based skilled birth attendants (CSBAs), as well as community leaders including traditional leaders, religious leaders and local elites; staff of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) at the community, union, upazila and district levels on the Essential Nutrition Actions (ENA) and Essential Hygiene Actions (EHA) Framework; (iii) promoting ENA and EHA, including lactation management and adolescent nutrition practices; (iv) institutional strengthening for improving WASH infrastructure and behavior; (v) building capacities on nutrition in emergencies; and (vi) providing support for national and international events to raise awareness on nutrition-related topics. As already described, project start-up was considerably delayed and effective project implementation did not happen until the 2nd and 3rd quarter of FY 18. It is to the credit of the project that they have made significant progress in some areas, while the implementation in others needs reconfiguration and acceleration. Table 4 summarizes the types of participants and groups engaged under Purpose 2 by the SAPLING Project. Progress on each of the activities being implemented under Purpose 2 are detailed in the sections which follow. Table 4. Participants and Groups in the SAPLING Project under Purpose 2

Current Membership/Sex LOA Type of Participant/Site Total Female Male Target MCHN Groups 1,350 1,350 MCHN Group Participants 10,859 10,859 0 10,824 Adolescent Group Participants 13,619 13,619 0 15,000 Nutrition Fairs 0 260 Cooking Demonstrations 26 8,100 Little Doctors Program Participants 1,154 559 595 3,840 GoB Primary Schools 74 256 Children Under Two Participants in GMP Sessions 7,598 11,791 MoHFW Staff in Community Clinics, Upazila Health 251 73 178 Complexes and the Bandarban District Hospital Traditional Leaders, Religious Leaders and Local 2,736 671 94 577 Elites (for ENA-EHA Orientations) Community Health Service Workers 472 458 14 Secondary Schools Participating in WASH 15 TBD Upazila WATSAN Committees 5 5 Union WATSAN Committees 11 11 Ward WATSAN Committees 99 99 Water User Committees 35 100

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

1. Training of CHSWs, Other Field Staff and Senior Technical Officers. The CHSWs are the first point of contact for the community and especially with PLW who have been targeted by the project. They are selected from paras within the working area and speak the local language of the communities they serve so they are an integral part of the project and easily accessible for project participants. Each CHSW has responsibility for 2 to 3 paras in the hilly areas and 4 to 5 paras in the plain lands, which can mean substantial travel time by foot/boat or just by foot, since public transport can be scarce. The CHSWs are required to have a minimum of ten years of education and willingness to move freely within her working area and outside. However, it has not been easy to recruit women with the required education levels, and the criteria has been lowered, especially in the hill areas, to include women with seven to eight years of schooling. This results in variation in education levels and variation in the capacities, skills and understanding of CHSWs, leading to uneven implementation results. The CHSWs are considered volunteers. They are expected to work 3 to 4 days a week and only for a half day. However, due to the distances that they need to travel within and between paras, they generally have to work for a full day and sometimes they may have to stay overnight in a para away from home. This combined with the fact that the salary is considered low in comparison with the current rates enjoyed by similar workers in other organizations in the district has caused a constant turnover in the position. The MTE team was told that every month, there is at least one CHSW per union in the 24 unions who resigns. UNDP has just started a new project in Bandarban and is recruiting female field workers/volunteers at a significantly higher salary, and during the MTE a couple of CHSWs resigned to join the UNDP project. A total of 491 CHSWs have been trained to date. The initial batch of CHSWs received Foundation Training for 21 days. This was an integrated training focusing on concepts, including the ToC and how the project components are expected to come together to achieve the goal of the project. Since the initial training, other technical topics critical to the project such as lactation management and early initiation of breast feeding have been added to the curriculum. The current CHSW training curriculum includes training on the ENA and EHA Frameworks for five days; growth monitoring and promotion for two days; lactation management for three days; and register maintenance for two and half days. Changing the training from continuous 21 days to shorter periods has decreased the dislocation of CHSWs from their work and allows dedicated focus on a single topic. The basic training for all currently employed CHSWs has been completed, and in the next few months, basic training will only be provided to new recruits. The training curriculum is generic, with no variation factored in to accommodate the difference in knowledge and practices in the hill versus the plainlands contexts. For example, the CHSW needs to consider what information she should provide on continuous breast feeding to the lactating mother who may not be able to breastfeed since she has to be away from the home working in the jhum farm. Similarly, she also needs to think how a pregnant woman will complete the required four antenatal care appointments if she is required for jhum work; and how she will complete the immunizations she needs, especially if she has not received the earlier tetanus toxoid immunization which she should have received as an adolescent. The CHSW has been trained in the information that she has to impart to the PLWs, but she has not been taught on how she should advise PLWs for appropriate implementation of the messages. The MTE observed that the CHSWs do not have a good understanding of the reasons behind the actions they have been taught to promote and any follow up actions that would be required, such as why and when she should refer a child who does not look well to the doctor, what she should do to see that the child gets the attention s/he needs, or why repeated episodes of illness are not good for a child who is already nutritionally challenged. Her training needs to be focused on how to identify nutrition problems and what she should do when problems are identified. There is no arrangement in the project for refresher training. Continuous capacity development and strengthening of CHSWs is being done only through the monthly Learning and Sharing meetings

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 coordinated by the MCHN TOs and also attended by the FFs. The focus in this one-day meeting is to learn from each other’s experience on issues and constraints that have emerged in the field. The CHSWs are supervised by the Union Supervisors. This supervision is limited to checking on the completion of activities, such as the numbers of household visits completed, the number of courtyard sessions (uthan boithok) with PLWs that have been completed, and the number of GMP sessions completed, against the targets set for each of these. The supervision should also focus on the quality of her work – how effective is the CHSW in communicating the critical messages, are the sessions interactive, and do the participants internalize any of what they are being told. The Union Supervisor and the MCHN TO also need to have a better understanding of their roles as supervisors, both for ensuring that the activity has been completed and is of acceptable quality. The focus for SAPLING has been to complete all of the training which would affect field implementation activities, especially in light of the delays in implementing the project. This has resulted in the MCHN TOs being fully occupied with training activities with no time to monitor field implementation by CHSWs. As most of the training has now been completed, TOs should have more time now to provide better monitoring of and technical support for field activities. 2. Capacity Building of Health Service Providers from the MOHFW, NGOs, Village Doctors, TBAs/CSBAs, Traditional Leaders, Religious Leaders, and Local Elites. SAPLING has provided a one- day sensitization and 2 to 3 days training on the ENA/EHA Framework and lactation management to (a) MOHFW staff at all levels from the union to the upazila, (b) community service providers such as the TBAs and CSBAs, (c) village doctors and (d) non-health workers such the Agriculture Extension workers and WASH mobilizers. Training on tropical and infectious disease detection and prevention is for MoHFW staff, NGOs and community members has been completed. All training recipients were appreciative of the training, though the village doctors were not sure how they would be able to use the ideas in their practice. The MOHFW staff at all levels felt that this enhanced and reinforced their knowledge on nutrition, lactation management and breast feeding. They also felt that it has helped in building a positive relationship with SAPLING staff at the district, upazila and union levels and established the foundations for further collaboration with the MoHFW. In his meeting with the MTE team, the Civil Surgeon requested SAPLING to provide support in a few areas, including birth registration, identification of dropouts/default tracking in the deworming program, and antenatal care for pregnant women. He also suggested that the project establish a referral system for pregnant women with ANC/PNC complications or for those seeking facility-based delivery care. SAPLING and the Civil Surgeon’s office have worked closely together to address problems in the field and have supported each other in addressing issues and community concerns. There is significant scope for SAPLING to develop strong linkages with the MoHFW for referral care and to establish a model to ensure the continuum of care, in which SAPLING’s role would be to identify children and PLWs in need of referral care and refer them to MoHFW or NGO facilities. The role of both the government and NGOs would be to provide appropriate service and follow up. Through the time of the MTE, 491 Community Health Service Workers, 13 senior technical and 81 SAPLING field staff, 5,744 PLW, 671 community members including 248 traditional leaders, 180 religious leaders, and 240 local elites, and 23 MoHFW staff, have been trained on health, hygiene, and nutrition. 3. Promotion of ENA and EHA. SAPLING promotes ENA, EHA and adolescent nutrition practices in the community through several approaches described below. MCHN Group sessions. Pregnant and lactating women as well as non-pregnant and non-lactating poor and extreme poor IEHFP participants receive messages on health and nutrition in sessions conducted through the MCHN and IEHFP groups. The messages are based on the ENA/EHA Framework and includes colostrum feeding, exclusive breast feeding (EBF), early initiated breastfeeding (EIBF), and appropriate latching for breastfeeding, appropriate diet for the PLW and the infant, care of a sick child,

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 required variation in diet to make it minimally acceptable, hand washing and use of sanitary latrines. The PLWs did express reluctance to attend the sessions as the timing clashed with their time for jhum work. In the sessions observed by the MTE the provision of information and knowledge seemed a didactic process, i.e., it was one-sided with the CHSWs talking without paying any attention to the group’s reaction. In discussions with the MTE team, PLWs and senior women within the MCHN groups expressed appreciation of the knowledge on colostrum feeding, EIBF, EBF, and hand washing, and said they valued this knowledge. They agreed with the message around breastfeeding and EBF and said they all practiced these, often through the infants 2nd year. They also added that they fed their infants rice paste often as early as two months along with breast milk, explaining that as they are out for jhum work for several months, the infant is left behind with a care giver, and has to be given food other than breast milk. Interestingly though, they didn’t consider giving the rice paste as being contrary to EBF. Several talked about expressing breast milk into a small container and feeding it later to the infant. The MTE team was not sure if this was a slowly growing practice or new Members of an knowledge that they had received from the CHSW which MCHN Group they felt would be appropriate to share with the team. When asked about animal source food that they feed the child, they responded that they know eggs, chicken and fish are good, but they often do not have the resources to buy those food and have also been told by their elders that the infant should not be given anything other than rice paste as these would not be good for the child and would produce “heat” in the body. The diet of lactating women also seems to be restricted traditionally to boiled rice with salt, dried fish paste, and occasional vegetables. Within this context of entrenched beliefs and traditional practices, it is difficult to change practices without constant reiteration of the messages and support at the community and household levels. This is a challenge and should be an area of focus for SAPLING in the remaining project period. Household Visits and Counselling of PLWs. The CHSW is required to visit about sixteen households in a month to reinforce messages and provide individual counselling. She does not visit the households of the newly married and non-pregnant and non-lactating women, missing the opportunity to talk about spacing, a critical factor for child undernutrition. Behavior change is the focus of the SAPLING strategy. The MTE observed, however, that the CHSW, a critical player in this, takes a passive role since she has not been trained to be responsible for affecting behavior change in the family and community. She has basically been trained to pass on messages. Growth Monitoring and Promotion (GMP). The GMP sessions are held alongside planned immunization sessions. The attendance in the sessions observed by the MTE, seemed good. The mothers liked the growth cards as they felt it gave them a “picture” of how their child was doing. In explaining the card to the MTE team, the mothers said that the child was doing well when the weight was in the green and yellow band, but the child was not in good health when the weight was in the red band and the child should then be referred to a doctor. The understanding is not correct, since waiting for a child’s weight to be in the red band before seeking medical care may be too late. Moreover, there was no discussion facilitated on weight faltering and the effect of repeated bouts of illness on weight, especially for a nutritionally-compromised child. Height measurement has been stopped in most places visited due to cultural concerns of the families in having their child measured in a prone position. Pregnancy Care (ANC/PNC) Delivery. The CHSW identifies a woman as pregnant during the training sessions. However, to have the women registered as pregnant and entitled to receive project benefits,

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

SAPLING requires her to be identified as pregnant by MoHFW staff or another medical care provider from an NGO. This results in a loss of time before the woman is identified and registered as pregnant. A CHSW can be trained to identify a woman as pregnant. CHSW’s in other NGO programs have done this and continue to identify pregnant women as pregnant, so there should be no problem for the CHSW in SAPLING to identify a pregnant woman, register her, and refer her to a MoHFW or NGO facility for ANC/PNC. As regards safe delivery, several of the CHSWs in SAPLING have been trained as CSBAs under the first UNDP project in Bandarban District. These CHSWs are also doing deliveries in the community. SAPLING should work with the MoHFW and NGOs to develop a strategy for these CHSWs to coordinate with health facilities so that they can continue performing deliveries and make referrals for PLW with complications. CHSWs/CSBAs can also be trained to do the basic PNC and follow-up on the neonate, as both have significant possibility of developing morbidity which could lead to mortality. The GoB has a initiated a new social safety net program, implemented through the Union Parishad, which will provide a monthly stipend of BDT 800 to very poor PLWs for three years from the 1st trimester of pregnancy through the child’s 3rd year. SAPLING should think of developing linkages with this program through the Union Parishads to support the very poor PLWs participating in their project. Collaboration with MoHFW and other NGOs for Referral. The MNCH groups complained of lack of health facilities, either MoHFW facilities or NGO/private facilities. The MTE did visit a few MoHFW facilities at the union and community-levels, and the staff there were very keen to develop referral linkages, especially to address complications for a pregnant woman or a sick child. Clinics of the Smiling Sun franchise with trained doctors, nurses or midwives were also available and willing to provide around the clock services. SAPLING can identify fully functional facilities, both of the MoHFW and the private sector, and develop referral linkages. An agreement can be developed for this collaboration with clarification on the roles of roles and responsibilities of all parties in this partnership. 4. Adolescent Group Sessions. To date approximately 900 Adolescent Girls Group adolescent girls groups have been formed. The MTE team met with several groups, and the confidence and enthusiasm of the members was very apparent. They were eager to share their progress and appreciated most the sessions on menstrual hygiene, hand washing, and use of latrines. For the groups in the remote hill paras, the availability of sanitary napkins is an issue as the market is very far. The members requested support from SAPLING to get the napkins. SAPLING could consider training the adolescent girls groups to make their own sanitary napkins and facilitate access for them to obtain the raw materials required for this purpose. They should coordinate with other NGOs/organizations who already produce sanitary napkins for sale, to be training resources. The adolescent girls value education and do not like the sessions to clash with their school or college timing. They suggested that the session timings be changed to school/college holiday periods, if possible, and the MTE encourages SAPLING to explore this. The participants also asked for iron tablets and training in other life skills, sports/games and singing/dancing. SAPLING could also consider using the group sessions to reinforce nutrition and growth messages as female bodies change in puberty and beyond and mentor and support the groups to function as agents on hand-washing and use of latrines in their households. 5. Little Doctors. Little Doctors is a government program which teaches nutrition, hygiene, and sanitation to primary school students. SAPLING supports this program by providing specialized training

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 on health and nutrition. This includes training on production of the tippy tap and handwashing at six critical times. To date approximately 77 Little Doctors groups have received this training. 6. Institutional Strengthening for Improving WASH Infrastructure and Behavior. The SAPLING WASH strategy is Little Doctors comprised of three pillars including (i) improved water and sanitation governance that supports an enabling policy and institutional environment to increase the accessibility of safe water, (ii) community mobilization and hygiene promotion for behavior change, and (iii) sanitation marketing to increase access to services and strengthening hardware. The strategy is being implemented in the eleven most vulnerable unions (see more on this in next section that describes Purpose 3) selected partly on the basis of open defecation rates derived from the SAPLING Household Census. There are two approaches being used to implement the strategy. One of these is implementation of a full WASH package for the eleven vulnerable unions which includes 100 paras comprised of rehabilitation and construction of water supply system, reactivation and capacity development of Water and Sanitation (WATSAN) committees at all levels and Water User Committees (WUC) at the community level, sanitation marketing, and community mobilization and hygiene promotion. Most of the paras in the eleven vulnerable unions have existing water supply systems which do not provide uninterrupted water. These systems, however, need repair, rehabilitation or maintenance. A basic WASH package is being implemented in the remainder of SAPLING’s targeted paras which have no potable water source. The strategy here consists of community mobilization and health, hygiene and nutrition promotion with key nutrition and hygiene messages, through IEHFP and PLW groups, high schools, the Little Doctors program and adolescent girls groups. The MTE observed good progress in current activities with formation and activation of WATSAN Committees and WUC at all levels. The WATSAN Committees are being steered by the local government structures and the Department of Public Health Engineering (DPHE), with SAPLING playing a facilitation role. These relationships are likely to be sustained after the project ends. The WATSAN schemes which include gravity flow systems, deep set pump, ring well, or rain water harvesting, have been identified for implementation in the next fiscal year in 35 out of the 100 paras in the eleven vulnerable unions. The para-based WUCs are in charge of the water supply options and have two caretakers for each of the water points. Education and awareness generation programs are being implemented by the SAPLING WASH Community Mobiliser as facilitator. One of the bottlenecks in these paras are the DPHE mechanics who are responsible for the repair and maintenance of the water supply systems. These mechanics are all union-based and are reluctant to go to the remote paras where travel is very difficult. Even if they agree to do the repairs, their skills have not been updated and are inadequate to perform some of the maintenance work required. SAPLING will need to look at alternative capacities for repair and maintenance. The sanitation marketing strategy is scheduled to begin in the next fiscal year. SAPLING has an Environmental Mitigation and Monitoring Plan (EMMP) in place. As per the conditions identified for the Environmental Status Report (ESR) FY17, a Water Quality Assurance Plan (WQAP) was included in the EMMP during the submission of ESR FY18 in accordance with WHO standards. In FY18 SAPLING advocated with DPHE for the successful implementation of 9 water systems. As these were installed by the GoB, the testing is their responsibility in accordance with GoB policies. In FY19, SAPLING is advocating with DPHE to install an additional 34 systems, and will work with WUCs to directly rehabilitate 35 water points. These will all require appropriate testing which SAPLING should report against in its ESR accordingly. The progress in the use of sanitary latrines has been slow. In an area where water supply is scarce, and

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 access to sanitation facilities is limited this is understandable. Open defecation is the norm, with people going out into the forest to defecate. Wild pigs are known to consume the feces and people use bamboo sticks to clean themselves instead of using their hands. In discussions with the MTE, the groups said that they had been told about the use of latrines but they expressed some reluctance to use them. They cited the presence of dark spirits in the latrines who would come into the homes, bad odors which come into the home, and lack of water. The formative research done by the project has confirmed these findings and has recommended identification of acceptable and appropriate solutions that do not use water or emit odors such as the Arborloo17, especially during the jhum season, and other types of latrines. SAPLING, in its WASH strategy has decided to focus on a few latrine options which they consider appropriate for Bandarban such as the ventilated improved pit with cover which provides protection from insects and unpleasant odors, pour flush onset/direct pit which provides a water seal and offers better odor and insect control, pour flush off set pit which is an improvement to the pour flush pit latrine, and the Arborloo for jhum fields. These options are affordable and the decision should not be to promote any one type, but to promote the type which is appropriate for the particular para and terrain. Relative to hygiene behavior, SAPLING has been promoting optimal hygiene and handwashing behavior across the entire community in IEHFP sessions, with PLW groups, with adolescent girls groups, with BDRCS volunteers, in school-based WASH training and campaigns for high school students, with WATSAN committees and WUC training, with Little Doctors, in training for MOHFW staff, traditional birth attendants and village doctors, in union and upazila-level nutrition fairs, and in awareness raising during special events. The ultimate outcome that the project is seeking is handwashing by caregivers at five critical times (before eating, before feeding a child, after defecation, after cleaning the bottom of a child, and before preparing and serving food), and the SAPLING FY 18 ARR reported an increase in practice from 4% at the baseline to 7% in FY18. Water scarcity is one of the barriers in handwashing in many paras, along with the length of time needed to overcome traditional practices. While soap is available, ash has been seen only in a few remote locations. Use of soap and handwashing is still a work in progress until socio-cultural constraints are effectively addressed, which is the focus of SAPLING now. 7. Nutrition in Emergencies and Day Observations. The training for addressing nutrition during emergencies has just been initiated. The upazila and union DMCs have been given this training. In a meeting with the MTE team, members of one Union DMC in Lama Upazila felt that the training was very useful since it was a reinforcement of information they already knew. They felt that the training needs to be more about how the DMCs would use the information. The training curriculum also is generalized to all disasters and not to disasters which are prevalent in Bandarban. Therefore, the curriculum needs to be reviewed and revised to make it more appropriate for disasters and emergencies common to Bandarban. SAPLING also collaborates and provides support to the MoHFW and DPHE for observing national or international observance days which have a special bearing on nutrition and health, such as the World Health Day, World Malaria Day, Safe Motherhood Day, National Nutrition and Breastfeeding Week, and the Global Hand Washing Day. The MoHFW appreciates this support for effective observance, and SAPLINGS participation has raised the profile of the project. C. Purpose 3: Mitigate, Adapt to and Recover from Shocks Under Purpose 3, the SAPLING Project focuses on natural and human-induced disaster preparedness and risk reduction. Two stages have been used in the development and implementation of activities under Purpose 3. The first stage focused on strategy development around five elements, including (1) prioritization of geographic areas based on vulnerabilities, (2) developing relations with appropriate

17 The Arborloo is a shallow pit filled with excreta and soil ash and then covered with soil and a tree planted on top

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

organizations to establish or strengthen volunteer groups to increase the potential for sustaining impact, (3) identification of partners to develop community-based early warning systems to save lives and assets, (4) engaging traditional leaders in planning and developing messages to increase the uptake of the disaster risk reduction practices being promoted, and (5) gender inclusion in disaster preparedness and risk reduction. During this stage, SAPLING identified the most vulnerable unions for deeper DRM actions, established partnerships with the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society (BDRCS) and the GoB Fire Service and Civil Defense (FSCD) to develop adolescent and youth urban community volunteers, engaged the Geography Department at Dhaka University to develop models needed for early warning systems for landslides and flash floods, and advocated for representation by headmen and karbaris in the UDMCs and CDRTs. The second stage focused on implementation of Purpose 3 activities in three distinct geographic areas with different types of intervention packages. In all 24 Unions and the two pouroshavas in which SAPLING is being implemented, the SAPLING strategy is to reactivate UDMCs and include basic DRM messages in the training curricula for IEHFP and MCHN groups and support the GoB to train urban Community Volunteers. The vulnerability analysis conducted by the project identified eleven vulnerable unions, and the SAPLING strategy under Purpose 3 in these unions is to expand on the basic DRM by also (1) building the capacities of UDMCs to undertake a CRA process and develop RRAPs, (2) build capacities of Red Crescent Youth Volunteers (RCYVs) and ward-level CDRTs, (3) form school-based Forest Management Brigades (FMBs) and (4) link eligible participating households to GoB safety nets. Among the eleven most vulnerable unions, one union was identified in each of the five Upazilas. In each of these five unions, the Purpose 3 approaches have been further expanded to include expanded DRM training with vulnerable households and development of household level DRM action plans. Table 5 illustrates the three types of approaches being implemented in the different geographic zones. Table 5 – Purpose 3 Approaches for Different Geographic Areas in SAPLING

Expanded Full Basic Package Package Package DRM Interventions 24 2 5 11 Unions Unions Pouroshavas Unions DRM messages to IEHFP households Yes Yes Yes Yes DRM messages to MCHN groups Yes Yes Yes Yes DMC reactivation (Union, Upazila and Pouroshava) Yes Yes Yes Yes DMC members trained Yes Yes Yes Yes CRA facilitation ------Yes Yes RRAP development and implementation ------Yes Yes RCYV formed and trained at District and Upazila --- Yes Yes Yes Units18 Ward-level CDRT formed and trained ------Yes Yes School-based NRM Forest Management Brigades and --- Yes Yes Yes Pre-RCY school groups formed19 Linking eligible HH to GoB safety net ------Yes Yes DRR sessions (6 additional) conducted for selected ------Yes HH DRR action plan developed at HH level for selected ------Yes HH FSCD/Urban Community Volunteers --- Yes ------

18 RCYV groups established in BDRCS’s District and Upazila Units which include some of the 5 or 11 unions. 19 FMBs formed in 15 schools from 5 Upazilas and 2 Pouroshavas which include some of the 5 or 11 unions.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

Output clusters produced under Purpose 3 include reactivation of DMCs, building capacities of UDMCs to use a CRA process in developing RRAPs, building capacities of selected households to develop household-level DRM action plans, strengthening community capacities for disaster response through CDRTs and youth volunteers, strengthening pouroshava-level capacities for urban disaster response through urban community volunteers associated with FSCD, formation and sensitization of school-based FMBs to protect and manage community natural resources, advocacy for household access to GoB safety nets, promotion of gender inclusion across DRM activities, building community awareness on DRM, and developing early warning system models appropriate for the CHT. Table 6 provides information on the participants and groups engaged in activities under Purpose 3 as of September 2018. The sections which follow detail observations made by the MTE for each of the output clusters. 1. Reactivation of Disaster Management Committees. As a first step to institutional strengthening, SAPLING provided extensive support to DMCs in the 24 unions, 5 upazilas and 2 pouroshavas to make them functional in assisting communities and households to prepare for shocks. All 31 DMCs, each comprised of 36 to 40 members, have been reactivated and 90% of these committees had received training on DRM by September 2018. SAPLING coordinates the development of UDMC meeting agendas and provides transport allowances to the committee members for attending committee meetings, which raises concerns about the sustainability of the capacity building after the project has been completed. Apart from the reactivation of the DMCs, SAPLING follows up on DRM policies and procedures in the context of the CHT with the Department of Disaster Management, which is the GoB focal point for implementing disaster risk reduction activities. This policy advocacy by the project resulted in a revision to the Standing Order on Disasters to incorporate representation of traditional structures on the UDMCs. A total of 108 headmen and karbaris have since been included in the 24 UDMCs reactivated by SAPLING. Table 6. Participants and Groups in the SAPLING Project under Purpose 3

Current Membership LOA Type of Participant/Group Total Female Male Target Union Disaster Management Committees reactivated 24 152 678 24 Upazila Disaster Management Committees reactivated 5 23 154 5 Pouroshava Disaster Management Committees 2 8 40 2 reactivated Number of Community Risk Assessments conducted 11 11 Number of Risk Reduction Action Plans developed 11 11 Number of households trained on preparedness 2,301 10,603 212 5,113 strategies, including DRR plans Number of households with DRM action plan 2,301 10,603 212 5,113 Number of Groups received intensive DRR sessions 130 300 Community Disaster Response Teams formed 99 316 1,171 99 Red Crescent Youth Volunteer units formed 5 38 72 5 School Based Pre-RCY Volunteer groups formed 15 344 433 15 Urban Community Volunteers Enrolled 90 34 56 90 School-based Forest Management Brigades formed 14 119 161 15 Number of participants referred for GoB safety net 2,023 1,259 764 - Number of women-only groups participated in Gender 11 11 - 11 Inclusion in DRM activities (CRA/RRAP) Number of Participants in DRM/NRM Awareness 7,807 4,520 3,287 - Campaign Early Warning System Models developed - 1

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

The progress in 2018 on capacity building of these committees is notable. In December last year, all 31 DMCs targeted by the project were not fully functional, neither holding regular monthly meetings nor fulfilling required meeting quorum. Continued project support has enabled the committees to become operational. Committee meetings are scheduled regularly with the participation of two-thirds of the members. There is a high level of dependence, however, on project support, and SAPLING needs to develop a strategy for enabling the committees to remain functional without project support before the completion of the project. The Bandarban Pouroshava DMC reported increasing their annual emergency response budget allocation from BDT 20,000 to BDT 200,000. This is encouraging and has the potential for replication by other committees. The Upazila DMCs are vital to strengthening the efficiency of union-level committees in disseminating early warning, developing risk reduction programs, awareness raising, and emergency response, so the project needs to focus attention on these committees being able to provide this support on a sustainable basis. 2. Development of Risk Reduction Action Plans through Community Risk Assessments. A total of 175 risk reduction actions have been included in the eleven RRAPs that have been developed by UDMCs in the eleven vulnerable unions. These activities were identified using the GoB’s CRA tools adapted by the project for the CHT context. Implementation of 16 out of these 175 actions is scheduled for the second quarter of FY 2019 through cash-for-work provided by SAPLING, and these 16 schemes are designed mainly for water sources for household and agricultural use. The appropriate time for implementation of cash-for-work projects is between November and May during the dry season, so there are limitations on the types of activities that can be supported. The current annual budget allocation for cash-for-work for FY 18 is $100,000, and the 16 schemes are expected to require BDT 6.3 million (approximately US$ 78,000). The project is planning to allocate additional funds through fixed amount awards to be given to the local NGOs selected for NGO-capacity building (see page 30) to support implementation of these schemes. The implementation of the remaining actions is highly unlikely, unless additional resources can be found from other sources. The current plan is that SAPLING will support UDMCs to implement RRAPs using GoB and other resources throughout FY18- FY19. Priority Recommendation No. 10 described later addresses this. For the remaining life of SAPLING, the project will continue to facilitate community risk assessments in the eleven most vulnerable unions by UDMCs for the development of their annual RRAPs. In addition to the compiled union-level RRAPs, separate RRAPs will be developed for women and farmer groups. The approved RRAPs will help inform the allocation of any GoB and NGO funding UDMCs may receive to implement schemes prioritized by the community. 3. Intensive Household DRM Sessions and Development of DRM Action Plans. In addition to the basic disaster preparedness sessions conducted for all 46,520 IEHFP households, the project has developed six in-depth sessions for selected households in the five most vulnerable unions. At the time of the MTE, these intensive sessions had been completed for 130 groups from a target of 300 composed of 2,301 households from a target of 5,113 households. Session topics include the need for addressing disaster risks, available social services, household preventive measures to cope with disasters such as heavy rainfall, landslides, cyclones, flash floods, rodent and elephant attacks, fire, thunderstorms, or earthquakes, and the process for developing household DRM plans. The training is designed to enable the participants to formulate their own household-level DRM action plans. Households interviewed during the MTE reported that they have increased confidence to be able to prepare for disasters, and the most useful information provided by the project was sources of early warning messages, storing dried food, and rescuing the vulnerable including children, the elderly, pregnant and lactating members in the family first. Households who have participated in the training have prepared their household-level DRR Action Plans. Respondents, however, reported that the sessions did not include any information specifically for the shocks unique to a household such as illness, unemployment, food crisis, or water crisis (idiosyncratic shocks). The MTE also observed that some

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 covariate shocks and stress such as pest attacks, disease outbreaks, and land degradation are not fully covered by the training. Respondents were generally positive on the relevance of the SAPLING approach, and there is interest in extending the intervention to the other six unions among the eleven most vulnerable unions. Government officials at the district and upazila levels as well as the local elected bodies at the union level and the traditional leaders at the community-level reported to the MTE their interest in including these unions in the next implementation cycle of SAPLING (see Recommendation B-12 in Annex B). Occasionally, household-level emergencies occur that are beyond the scope of a household, including for example, a medical emergency in a para that requires travel costs to get to health services, a house fire, an animal attack, and so on. These emergencies are not large enough to merit an official emergency response, but the household needs emergency support. The social fund in a SILC can be used to cover some of these costs, but the costs may far exceed the amount available from the fund depending on SILC group policies. A possible option is to establish small, replenishable community-managed emergency funds for household emergencies under the management of an appropriate community institution (see Recommendation B-13 in Annex B)20. 4. Capacity Building for Disaster Response: Community Disaster Response Teams, Red Crescent Youth Volunteers, Urban Community Volunteers, and Forest Management Brigades. With technical assistance of the BDRCS, SAPLING has completed the formation of 99 CDRTs with1,487 members and has conducted training on first aid and search and rescue for 44 of these teams. The project also met its LoA targets for establishing five units of RCYVs with 110 girls and boys and fifteen groups of school- based pre-RCYVs with 777 adolescent girls and boys to lead community level search and rescue. These volunteers were given a Red Cross Red Crescent orientation, trained in first aid and basic DRM, and provided with personal protective equipment, rescue equipment and first aid boxes. For Urban Community Volunteers, enrolment of the LoA target of 90 volunteers with the FSCD has been completed in Bandarban Sadar Pouroshava and Lama Pouroshavas to join the search and rescue operations which would be led by the FSCD first responder teams in the event of a disaster. The FSCD conducted the training of these volunteers, with simulations, on the standard training modules for firefighting, first aid and search and rescue. SAPLING distributed personal protection equipment and search and rescue tools to the FSCD fire stations for use by the volunteers. The activity complements the GoB’s commitment to develop 62,000 UCVs countrywide. On FMBs, SAPLING formed 14 out of the LoA target of 15 school-based FMBs and provided training on the adverse impact of stone collection, deforestation and hill slope cutting, as well as on the importance of mitigation measures such as tree plantation and sapling nurseries. The engagement of adolescents and youth volunteers, both boys and girls, in the government first responder organizations is found to be a clear pathway to sustainability for the volunteer groups who are valuable resources for strengthening community capacities for disaster response. Those volunteers interviewed by the MTE were found to be enthusiastic, interested in learning, and most important, willing to continue as volunteers after the project ends. Among the 110 RCYVs, SAPLING produced 38 trainers who have been providing training to other CDRTs and BDRCS projects in Bandarban in exchange for remuneration. Some of the volunteers trained by the project have been involved in the emergency response to recent landslides in Bandarban Sadar and Ruma upazilas. The partnership developed by the project with both the FSCD and the BDRCS is found to be effective for establishing a sustainable core of volunteers to support emergency response in the rural and urban areas of the CHT.

20 The SAPLING proposal originally included this, but it was ultimately decided to not go forward with it due to issues of sustainability and disbursement. The MTE feels that this gap in the DRR support systems is significant enough to merit at least an attempt by the project to try to address the issues.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

5. Advocacy for Household Access to GoB Safety Net. The SAPLING Project is also engaged in advocacy for access to GoB safety net programs by eligible project participants. These safety net programs include the vulnerable group development program21, allowances for widows, allowances for elderly, allowances for lactating women, and the forty days employment (cash-for-work) program. As of the time of the MTE, the project had identified 2,023 (1,259 female and 764 male) participants as eligible for inclusion in the GoB safety nets. Response from the upazilas will not be known until the beginning of the next GOB financial year beginning in July 2019 when budget allocations for safety net programs are known. The MTE feels that there is likely to be little impact with this activity, however, unless GoB resources are increased for the safety net programs. The project plans to begin undertaken advocacy for greater funding for safety net programs in FY 19. 6. Gender Inclusion in DRM. The SAPLING project is committed to gender equity and social inclusion (GESI) under Purpose 3 and one element of the strategy is to ensure participation of women and members of the minority ethnic groups in the CRAs that have been conducted by UDMCs as they develop RRAPs. In support of this, SAPLING ensured that each UDMC conducted separate group meetings with women on understanding hazards and identification of priority needs for children, disabled, elderly, ill and PLW members in the family during an emergency. Ideally, women will be well-represented on DMCs, but since the membership in these is defined by government policies, only a few women are currently members the DMCs. Women represent 18% of UDMC members and 21% of CDRT members. The project has more influence on the configuration of volunteer groups and the percentage of female volunteers among the Red Crescent Youth Volunteers is 34%, among the Urban Community Volunteers it is 38%, and on the Forest Management Brigades it is 44%, much closer to the target of 50%. There is still a need to sensitize decision-makers regarding the importance of empowering women and girls to participate in DRM. 7. Community Awareness on DRM. As of September, 2018, a total of 7,807 (4,520 female and 3,287 male) people including project participants, other community members and representatives of GoB stakeholders have participated in SAPLING-organized events to raise awareness on issues related to protecting the environment, human-induced and natural hazards, and climate change. The International Day for Disaster Reduction, World Environment Day, and GoB National Disaster Preparedness Day were among those events held at the district and upazila levels. 8. Early Warning Systems. Under a partnership with the Geography and Environment Department of the Dhaka University, SAPLING is developing geospatial models needed for the piloting of early warning systems for landslide and flash floods in the CHT. Project participants and stakeholders have given high priority to Fire Warning Alarm developing these systems. The deliverable is due in December 2018. D. Cross-Cutting Themes: Gender Equity and Social Inclusion, Targeting of Youth, Addressing Environmental Risks and Local Capacity Building 1. Promoting Gender Equity and Social Inclusion. SAPLING has been designed around the theme that”…without transformational change in socio-cultural norms and structural barriers, households are limited in the advancement they can make toward improving their overall resilience capacity and, thus, ability to withstand shocks and stressors22” Thus, gender equity and social inclusion is a cross cutting component and is integral to the SAPLING TOC. The goal of its GESI strategy is to improve household food and nutrition security by engaging and empowering women, including adolescent girls, and marginalized people in

21 http://www.fpmu.gov.bd/agridrupal/content/vulnerable-group-development-vgd 22 Gender Equity and Social Inclusion Strategy -Revised

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 equitable resilience strategies and strengthen the broader environment to enable transformational change. Recognizing that effective integration and mainstreaming of GESI is essential to improve food and nutrition security in the Bandarban, the strategy seeks to integrate a gender and social transformative approach through its activities and is reflected in the project outcomes across all three purposes and in indicators in the monitoring and evaluation framework. This approach also addresses social inclusion by including all ethnic minority groups, adolescents and youth, and elderly men and women. The project expects that the transformation in relationships between men and women and inclusion of the disadvantaged groups in decision making will enable the project’s effects to be sustainable beyond the life of the project. The result is mixed in terms of ensuring gender balance among the project staff. Almost all of the front- line staff under Purpose 2 are female, with a few exceptions in paras where this hasn’t been possible. A few of the field facilitators under Purpose 1 and some of the technical staff are female, however, the number of women in senior positions gets thinner as one approaches the top, except that the CoP and M&E Director who are both very influential on the project are women. GESI is promoted in SAPLING through a series of gender transformative training sessions done through the IEHFP platform. This approach is called Nurturing Connections and has been adapted from HKI’s Nurturing Connections curriculum, which is being implemented in other countries and other locations in Bangladesh. The sessions are targeted toward three different peer groups, including IEHFP participants, senior women, and men in separate groups. The training is provided in twelve sessions divided into four thematic blocks. Each block includes training on the same issue to all three separate groups, followed by a mixed group session. Blocks 1 and 2 have been planned for completion in FY 18. The results observed by the MTE have been far from satisfactory. The front-line field level staff, i.e., CHSWs and FFs, have received a seven-day training and the TOs have received an orientation on the concept. At the time of the MTE, only Block I had been partially completed. Staff and program participants both seemed to have an incomplete and inadequate understanding of the concepts, and they appeared to be confused about the purpose and expected outcomes of the training. The attendance in the sessions, especially in the sessions for men’s group, was reported to be thin. Several of the participants also expressed discomfort with the methods used, which included games and role play, saying that it was not a part of their culture. While the Nurturing Connections has been successfully implemented in other countries and the plains districts in Bangladesh, it has not been fully adapted for the hill situation. SAPLING has recently completed analyzing data collected in a Qualitative Research effort which has identified critical information on gender roles and responsibilities and behavior across all the ethnic tribes. This, as well as other existing information in the country, should be used to inform a contextualization of the approach. It also appears that the training to technical and field staff was provided by external trainers who may not have been fully cognizant of the cultures in the Bandarban. The technical officers only received a one-day orientation which they felt was inadequate. There has also been a high turnover in the positions of gender coordinator and other staff responsible for implementing this cross-cutting theme, leaving the project with limited capacity for implementing the theme. 2. Targeting of Youth. Although the project’s Gender and Social Inclusion Strategy mentions youth inclusion, the MTE could not find any document which specifically described a practical strategy for targeting adolescents and youth. Nevertheless, many adolescents and youth are engaged in project activities. Many young adults under the age of 35, most of whom are female, are part of IEHFP, IGA, SILC, and MCHN groups that are participating in the project. The project also has some specific interventions that target adolescents and youth, including the Learning Corps Fellows activity under the cross-cutting theme of local capacity building, adolescent girls groups and the GoB Little Doctors

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 program under Purpose 2, and the work with various volunteer groups and school-based training under Purpose 3 including RCYVs, the school-based training on DRM, CDRTs, school-based FMBss and Urban Community Volunteers. Table 7 summarizes the participation of adolescents and youth in different project activities. Table 7. Participation of Adolescents and Youth in Project Activities

Interventions Total Achievements LOA Female Male Total Youth Learning Corps Fellows under the cross-cutting theme of Local Capacity Building 65 32 33 65 Adolescent Girl Participants in Purpose 2 15,000 13,619 --- 13,619 Little Doctors (Primary School Boys and Girls) in Purpose 2 3,840 559 595 1,154 Red Crescent Youth Volunteers in Purpose 3 110 38 72 110 School-based DRM Awareness Raising in Purpose 3 795 344 433 777 Community Disaster Response Teams in Purpose 3 1,485 316 1,171 1,487 School-Based Forest Management Brigades in Purpose 3 300 119 161 280 Urban Community Volunteers with the Fire Service and Civil Defense Department in Purpose 3 90 34 56 90 Total 21,685 15,061 2,521 17,582 Overall, SAPLING has engaged a total of 21,685 adolescent and youth in different activities. This represents a significant proportion of the total number of adolescents and youth in Bandarban District. In the Household Census conducted by the project on all households selected for participation, the number of persons between the ages of 10 to 35 years was 130,479 (Table C-4 in Annex C provides a more detailed distribution of population across age groups from this survey). Significant numbers of youth have been engaged in the activities described above as well as in other project activities such as IEHFP groups and IGA activities. The project’s M&E systems do not yet capture all of these numbers on adolescent and youth engagement. Since a commitment has been made to engaging youth as a cross-cutting theme, the project should at least have staff either in the M&E units or under each purpose who have designated as point persons to who monitor and promote youth engagement. Annex B contains a recommendation related to this observation from the MTE. 3. Addressing Environmental Risks. The main environmental risks to which SAPLING’s participants are exposed are of two types, either naturally occurring or man-made. Naturally occurring risks primarily involve flooding, landslides, and cyclones, but also crop pest infestations, livestock or crop diseases, and wild animal attacks. Man-made risks consist primarily of deforestation, soil erosion, silting of rivers and waterways, social conflict, and contamination of water sources from agricultural chemicals and animal or human waste. MTE observations of and discussions on how SAPLING has strengthened the capacities of project participants and intermediaries to better address and manage environmental risks through DRR activities, good aquaculture practices, and improved agricultural practices/technologies, are included as part of Section III under the relevant purposes. Of all the activities implemented in the SAPLING Project, seven were determined to have a potentially negative effect on the environment in the Initial Environmental Examination (IEE). For these seven activities, IEE conditions were established and mitigation measures have been defined in the Environmental Mitigation and Monitoring Plan (EMMP). This section discusses how well the project has addressed environmental compliance for FFP programs. The project-specific IEE was completed by an external consultant and approved by USAID in the third quarter of FY2016. SAPLING’s environmental specialist conducted multiple orientations on environmental compliance with USAID regulations for project staff, including TOs for horticulture and

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 animal husbandry, MCHN specialists, union supervisors, upazila coordinators and field facilitators in April 2016, and a one-day training for staff on the USAID/PERSUAP was conducted in May 2016. Environmental forms for screening potential demonstration plots for crops and ponds, plant composition monitoring, small-scale sanitation activities, small-scale water supply activities, and other activities were also completed in FY2016. According to data made available to the MTE Team, environmental screening of SAPLING’s IGA, IEHFP, LC, and aquaculture activities appear to be somewhat lagging. As of August 30, 2018, environmental screenings had been conducted for only 12% to 13% of its on- and off-farm IGA activities. This is due, at least in part, to delays in implementing activities and getting sufficient staff trained in environmental screenings. Generally, much of SAPLING’s compliance with the EMMP involves training participants in improved practices, such as good aquaculture practices; solid waste management; livestock disease control; proper handling, storage, use and application of fertilizers; water management practices linked to improved health and hygiene, mosquito-borne illnesses, and downstream effects of water withdrawal; site location for sanitation structures; water point maintenance and water quality monitoring; sound natural resource management practices; and alternatives to jhum cultivation. Given the generally good progress achieved in IEHFP, IGA, SILC, WASH and aquaculture trainings as of the MTE, SAPLING’s activities to build capacities of project participants and intermediaries to deal with and mitigate environmental risks appear to be primarily on track. Over the course of FY2019, the focus should continue to be on environmental screenings for on- and off-farm IGA activities, as well as contour farm demonstration plots and LCs more generally. In conjunction with the Environmental Specialist, Learning Corps Fellows, FFs, and TOs conduct environmental screenings using the relevant check lists. For example, ponds are monitored for pH by the Learning Corps Fellows, FFs, and fisheries TOs using a Good Aquaculture Practices Awareness checklist. Activities associated with environmental compliance, including trainings and screenings should be included in SAPLING’s DAP so that they are perceived as regularly scheduled activities for all relevant staff and progress can be easily monitored. 4. Local Capacity Building. The local capacity building theme in SAPLING is not really a cross-cutting theme like gender equality and social inclusion, targeting youth and addressing environmental risk. The whole project, in fact, is about building local capacities. The activities that fall here under local capacity are three sets of interventions that fall outside of the project’s ToC but are still relevant for long-term development in the CHT. These are the Learning Corps, capacity building of the three implementing partners (IPs), GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong, and an initiative to build the capacities of six additional local partners from Bandarban District. Learning Corps. The Learning Corps is a professional career development opportunity for young people from the CHT in need of job experience. These young people benefit from the on-the-job experience that they acquire and they are also specifically mentored by an individual SAPLING staff member. While acquiring experience, the fellows also provide useful support for the program. A total of 64 Learning Corps Fellows have been recruited with 24 of these completing their one-year period of engagement. Over half of these graduated Learning Corps Fellows have obtained jobs, at least in part because of the experience acquired in SAPLING. This is good life-changing impact. Although the numbers are small, the activity seems to be at an appropriate scale given the resources available. Capacity Building of GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong. The capacity building of the three IPs, GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong, takes two forms. One of these is capacity building to support effective implementation of SAPLING. The other is additional organizational development capacity building that addresses needs identified in an organizational capacity assessment. For SAPLING, priority should be given to the first form of capacity building, since it serves dual purposes, i.e., enhancing the impact of SAPLING while building the local capacities of these IPs. In order to show significant impact on the organizational capacities of IPs to be able to implement SAPLING, the IPs need to have a role in the project that enables them to acquire experience with implementing the complex SAPLING strategy.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

This is happening to some extent in Rowangchari and Thanchi Upazilas where GRAUS manages the direct implementation of the project. This is barely happening at all, however, in the other three upazilas since Toymu and Tahzingdong only provide frontline staff. Planning and implementation are entirely managed by Caritas in these upazilas. On the second form of capacity building, organizational assessments have been done on the three partners, and the IPs have participated in the four trainings organized on USAID Rules and Regulations, Procurement Policy Review, Emergency Response and Human Resource Management. Priority Recommendations #12 and #14 propose a major restructuring at the Upazila level and a shifting of budget resources so that the three IPs will have significantly expanded responsibilities for planning and budgeting in an upazila. This will place significant demands on their capacities, and there will be an even greater need for capacity building support for them. Caritas and HKI will need to commit themselves to undertaking this capacity building of IPs, and resources previously allocated for general organizational development capacity building of the IPs should be reallocated to supporting this more specific capacity building to enable the IPs to effectively undertake their expanded responsibilities in SAPLING. Recommendation B-15 in Annex B provides more detail on this. Capacity Building of Local NGOs. During negotiations in 2017 and 2018 for the approval of five selected local NGOs to implement project activities, the project agreed to provide organizational development capacity building to local NGOs. SAPLING initiated a rigorous and transparent process for selecting these organizations, and six local NGOs were selected for organizational capacity building. Organizational capacity assessments have been conducted and “Improvement Action Plans” have been developed. Four common training workshops have been implemented on USAID Rules and Regulations, Procurement Policies and Procedures, Emergency Response, and Human Resource Management. The MTE observed that the NGOS selected have a very wide range of capacities. Some of them are fairly strong and have already implemented international donor funded activities, while others are fairly nascent as organizations. Capacity building needs are going to be very different across this range of capacities, and common training workshops may not be the best way to address different capacity building needs effectively. The SAPLING approach seems to be “one size fits all”. All NGOs attend the same workshops and hear the same messages, which are relevant for some but are “old news” for others. There also seems to be some confusion on the part of the selected NGOs as to the purpose of the capacity building, since it is not tied to a specific type of project activity. Since the impact of this investment as it appears at the time of the MTE is unlikely to justify the investment in terms of staff time and resources, the MTE would like to have recommended that this activity be dropped. However, the project would likely face problems with the CHTRC and the BHRC if this were done. Recommendation B-16 in Annex B, provides a way to enhance the impact of this work specifically in support of SAPLING while also retaining the activity with the hope of having greater impact on the capacities of these six NGOs. E. Theory of Change, Logical Framework & Targeting 1. Theory of Change. According to FFP guidance23, a ToC describes how all project outputs will contribute to a series of outcomes that ultimately enables achievement of the activity’s goal. The ToC includes two parts, (a) a diagram or set of diagrams that illustrates the pathways of change from outputs through a series of intermediate outcomes and eventually to the activity goal, and (b) a ToC narrative that further explains and adds to the plausibility of the pathways depicted in the diagram(s). The ToC diagrams should show not only how the outcomes will be achieved but also how they will be sustained. FFP expects changes at a population level, therefore, in addition to activities that influence the practices

23 USAID’s Office of Food For Peace Policy and Guidance For Monitoring, Evaluation, and Reporting For Development Food Security Activities, December 2016 31

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 and behaviors among the activity’s direct participants, the ToC diagrams should depict the activities that will influence population-level changes implemented by other parties. For the most part, SAPLING is doing a good job of following the FFP guidelines for the ToC. There are diagrams and a narrative conforming to FFP guidance. Cross-purpose linkages and assumptions are shown, but outputs produced by other actors and pre-conditioned outcomes are not shown. The ToC is supposed to be the tool that guides the strategic design of a project to ensure that the goal is achieved and to guide project implementation so that implementation staff can see how what they are doing is supposed to achieve the goal. The SAPLING ToC, however, is not very useful for this purpose. Good project design requires (1) a clear definition of an impact group, (2) a specific vision for change related to this impact group, (3) pathways for achieving the vision for change based on a good understanding of the livelihoods strategies24 of the impact group, and (4) sequential steps along each pathway, with some steps identified as “breakthrough”, i.e., outcomes that represent a significant leap forward or an advance that is not easily reversed. SAPLING’s Impact Group(s) are defined as all households regardless of economic status with pregnant and lactating women with children under two years of age, all poor and extreme poor households, adolescent girls, elderly, disabled, and female-headed households, and all adolescents for youth action and learning groups. It is fairly easy to identify PLW, adolescents, elderly, disabled and female-headed households, and the project has implemented a well-being analysis to identify the poor and extreme poor. But within the group of poor and extreme poor, there are different kinds of households, requiring different pathways to achieve a vision for food security, nutrition, gender equity and resilience. The poor and extreme poor in the CHT include, for example, landless households dependent on day labor, poor farm households in the lowlands with access to land, and farm households in the hill areas dependent on jhum cultivation. It is extremely difficult to portray all of the pathways for all of these different kinds of targeted impact groups in a single ToC. The vision for change for SAPLING is reflected in the goal which is improved, sustainable gender equitable food security, nutrition and resilience of vulnerable people in the CHT. The key elements in this goal are gender equity, food security, nutrition, and resilience, and the reason these are all featured in the goal is that this is what was called for by the original request for applications (RFA). The major pathways to achieve change on these different elements, however, will be different: • Likely major pathways for gender equity would mainly focus on women’s agency and enabling environment (including the socio-cultural context and the policy and legal framework) • Likely major pathways for food security would focus mainly on food production and income • Likely major pathways for nutrition would focus mainly on social and behavioral change and access to health services • Likely major pathways for resilience would focus mainly on household absorptive capacities, anticipatory and adaptive capacities, and transformative capacities As with the targeting, it will be extremely difficult to capture all of these pathways and their relative importance (some pathways are more important than others for a specific impact group/goal) in a single ToC. As long as projects like SAPLING are expected to develop a single ToC for a project that has multiple impact groups with multiple vision elements, the ToC will be less useful as a guide for strategic design and shifts in strategy over the life of the project based on the experience acquired.

24 Livelihoods strategies refers to the wider definition, i.e., how a household produces food, how a household produces income, how a household builds assets, how a household converts assets and how a household protects assets.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

2. Logical Framework. The SAPLING Logical Framework basically follows the guidelines provided by FFP for structure and content. Performance indicators are shown at each level from output through outcome, intermediate outcome, sub-purpose, purpose and goal. The most recent approved logical framework lists a total of 117 indicators including required FFP indicators and custom indicators. However, a number of indicators are duplicated across outputs or outcomes within a purpose, and the total number of unique indicators shown in the logical framework is 100, of which 57 are required indicators and the remaining 43 are custom indicators. The SAPLING Logical Framework suggests that only one of the goal-level indicators is associated with each purpose. For example, under Purpose 1, the depth of poverty indicator is shown; under Purpose 2, the stunting indicator is shown; and under Purpose 3, a placeholder is shown with an indication that an indicator from the resilience baseline research will be identified. In principle, goal-level indicators are supposed to capture the collective impact of all three purposes, not the impact of a single component of the project. In other words, activities in Purpose 2 and Purpose 3 will have impact on the depth of poverty indicator. Activities in Purpose 1 and Purpose 3 will have impact on stunting, and activities in Purpose 1 and Purpose 2 will have impact on household and community abilities to mitigate, absorb and adapt to shocks. The proposal by the SAPLING Logical Framework for having a resilience indicator at the goal level would be useful for capturing more of the collective impact on resilience. SAPLING has followed the FFP guidance on identifying assumptions that are factors and conditions that are outside the project’s influence that are necessary for an activity outcome, output or purpose to be achieved. The SAPLING Logical Framework has 78 levels which could show an assumption required to achieve the next level, e.g., an assumption for an output to produce an outcome. Only 13 assumptions are shown, however, and the assumptions are fairly general, e.g., “local conflicts”, “market prices”, floods/landslides”, “essential infrastructure”, “financial services” and “GoB…safety nets”, not reflecting the substantial contextual differences between the hill areas and the plain lands in the CHT or the significant contextual obstacles like security and the obstinance of the CHTRC and BHDC. In the next ToC workshop, the project should make a more rigorous effort identify contextualized assumptions. 3. Geographic and Beneficiary Targeting. SAPLING is working in five of the seven upazilas in Bandarban District. Within the five upazilas, SAPLING is working with 24 of the 25 Unions and both of the 2 pouroshavas. Within the 24 Unions and 2 Pouroshavas, SAPLING included 57,004 households from 1579 paras in the Household Census with a total population of 266,015. The project currently has 46,520 IEHFP participants (the platform from which most other participants are drawn) which means that the project is reaching between 81% to 82% of the households included in the census. This represents good coverage in the project area that will facilitate population-level changes and probably represents close to blanket coverage of poor and extreme poor households as identified in the well- being analysis. The project will have its largest impact on those households that are benefitting from multiple interventions, with members of the household participating in IEHFP groups, IGA activities, SILC, MCHN groups, and the household-focused disaster risk reduction capacity building. The number of these households that will benefit directly from all of the major interventions is estimated at less than 5,000, i.e., homestead food production (47,000), IGA support (10,000), access to capital through SILC (10,000), social and behavioral change communications for preventing malnutrition (11,000), and disaster risk reduction capacity building (5,000). For Purpose 3, SAPLING undertook a vulnerability analysis process to identify the most vulnerable unions from among the 24 that are participating in the project. The selection criteria used in the process were (a) access to public services, (b) existing hazards and consequences, (c) food production, (d) food shortages and (e) the GoB’s relief distribution in the last five years. The concept of resilience was not used in selecting the unions, but the project wants to move toward more resilience programming. It is not possible at this late date in the project life to reconsider the selection of vulnerable unions using

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 current resilience concepts. The project should, however, continue to look for ways to incorporate current resilience thinking in its strategy, especially around the idea of idiosyncratic shocks. On the surface, SAPLING appears to be a woman-focused project since 98% of participants in IEHFP groups are women, and the IEHFP platform is used to draw participants for other interventions. For example, over 98% of 9,155 IGA group members are women, all of the Learning Center leaders are women, most of the members of SILC groups are women, and nearly all of the participants under purpose 2 are women. When project staff are asked, however, if SAPLING is a woman-focused project, they adamantly insist that it is a household-focused project. Very few men from participating households are actively engaged in project interventions, however. F. Implementation Systems Implementation systems investigations in an MTE generally look at the project management systems, partner relations, collaborative learning and action systems (which includes monitoring and evaluation), cross-purpose integration within the project, collaboration and coordination with other actors, financial resource management, commodity management which only includes monetization in SAPLING, human resource management, and materials and equipment procurement and management systems. 1. Management Systems. Project management investigations typically look at management structures, project vision and leadership, strategic and operational planning, implementation problem-solving and decision-making, and communications. SAPLING is HKI’s first experience as consortium lead for a Title II project, and the demands on a consortium lead were not well understood by HKI when the project began implementation. This applied to HKI at all levels from country office through the region to headquarters. These demands included how to provide strategic guidance effectively across all purposes, higher levels of problem-solving since all problems come to the consortium lead, demands on reporting and representation, and setting up project-level systems for monitoring and evaluation, financial management and commodity management. In addition, there is a tendency by newcomers to the role to be “nervous” about accountability, which results in the organization wanting to have close control over the project and its resources, including project-level implementation systems and budget. HKI has had to learn on-the-job, and the HKI regional office is providing good support now for the project. Relative to vision and leadership for the project, a CoP is responsible for the strategic vision for a project but the SAPLING CoP is not allowed to enter the CHT often and is rarely afforded the opportunity to go down to the front-lines. This would not be a huge problem if there were a senior program manager based in Bandarban to reinforce the vision and leadership provided by the CoP. There is no one position in Bandarban District, however, that is responsible for program coordination, representation, and strategic vision for the project. The project has made several attempts to recruit a Deputy CoP but without success, and some HKI participants in this process have suggested that the recruitment has set the bar too high for finding someone with appropriate experience and skills. In the meantime, representation responsibilities have been assigned to Purpose 2 Team Leader with support from other senior staff in Bandarban. A Program Management Adviser has recently been placed in Bandarban to provide senior leadership and to work on improving coordination and planning systems, with pretty good effect. On planning and coordination, the project utilizes a number of mechanisms for facilitating planning, coordination and problem-solving. These include monthly SAPLING Project Management team meetings, usually in Dhaka. There are also monthly coordination meetings at the upazila-level that are functional and engage all sectors. There are also monthly coordination meetings at the union Level, but these are a bit disjointed. Meetings are held around Purpose 1 with FFs and TOs with the meeting led by the Union Supervisor. For Purpose 2, however, Learning and Sharing Meetings are held monthly for CHSWs which are called by the MCHN TOs in the upazila. Union Supervisors attend this meeting, but do not lead the meeting. Given the relatively small number of SILC Agents in an upazila, typically twelve, SILC agents

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 meet monthly at the upazila-level with the SILC Officer. Although occasional ad hoc meetings have been organized with senior representatives from SAPLING project partners, i.e., Executive Directors or Program Directors, these are not regularized, and coordination meetings at the district level are also irregular since there is no senior position based in Bandarban to take responsibility to call them. Relative to project structure, because of the way the project evolved with the role of Caritas significantly changed from the original design, some unusual project delivery structures are being used in SAPLING. In the initial SAPLING proposal, a local implementing partner was to be recruited for two of the five upazilas while Caritas would implement directly in the other three. GRAUS was approved by the CHTRC and began implementation in Rowangchari Upazila with line management from Upazila Coordinator to front-lines being GRAUS Staff. This same structure is being implemented in the recently assigned Thanchi Upazila to GRAUS. In the other three upazilas where Caritas was originally supposed to implement, however, the two approved local implementing partners, Toymu and Tahzingdong, only provide the front-line staff. The Union Supervisors and Upazila Coordinators remain assigned to Caritas. In all five upazilas, technical staff are provided by HKI and Caritas. The HKI technical staff in all five upazilas report to the supervisors at the district level. The Caritas technical staff in the three Caritas upazilas report to the Upazila Coordinator but in the other two GRAUS Upazilas, these staff report to supervisors at the district level. The result of all of this is that the central planning units for the project at the upazila and union levels are disjointed, i.e., line management is confusing, multiple implementation plans are developed for different sectors, and budgets are developed by different partners. This is highly inefficient and leads to problems with planning effectively. It also results in low level, but steady, tension between partners. It also contradicts the principle advocated by the SAPLING Project to build capacities of local partners. The current project delivery structure does not give much planning, budgeting or monitoring responsibilities to the three IPs, less so particularly for Toymu and Tahzingdong who only provide front-line staff for the project. Another element of project delivery is technical support, and the MTE found that front-line workers are not receiving enough technical support. This technical support is supposed be provided by TOs from HKI and Caritas and Union Supervisors. Union Supervisors have an extremely heavy workload across all three purposes in the project. On average, a Union Supervisor is responsible for 29 direct reports including Purpose 1 FFs, CHSWs, WASH Community Mobilizers, DRM FFs and SILC Agents. This very much limits the time they have to provide support in the field to front-line staff. The MTE also found that TOs who are specifically responsible for providing technical support to the front-lines are spending between 25% up to as much as 50% of their time on financial tasks. Much of the budget for project implementation is controlled by HKI, and TOs have been made responsible for preparing procurement requests related to training events, receiving cash advances to cover these costs where vendors will not accept non-cash payments, and then clearing these cash advances. This gives them much less time to provide technical support to the front-lines. Upazila Coordinators in four of the five upazilas have a moderate workload, with between 15 and 19 direct reports. The fifth upazila, Lama, has a large proportion of participants, so the workload for the Upazila Coordinator is heavy, with 26 either direct or dotted line reports. As indicated, front-line staff in the SAPLING Project includes FFs, CHSWs, SILC Agents, Field Facilitators for DRM, and WASH Community Mobilizers. Some of these staff, i.e., the FFs and Community Mobilizers are considered project staff, while others, i.e., CHSWs and SILC Agents, are considered community volunteers. Various reasons are given for this arrangement. Volunteers, for example, are supposed to become resident resources after the project ends. In the original proposal, the staff who are volunteers were not supposed to have to travel outside their para, but that has changed now so that all front-line staff have multiple paras for which they are responsible. This staff/volunteer distinction has led to various problems since a staff member gets a salary and benefits, while a volunteer only gets paid a stipend. In other words, an FF can get his/her travel expenses

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 reimbursed when he or she has to use a boat for travel or has to spend a night in a village. Volunteers have to pay these costs out-of-pocket. There is also a notable status distinction. Because FFs are staff with project IDs like other staff, there is a perception that they are at a higher level then volunteers. Using volunteers also raises the sustainability issue of how volunteers will continue to be motivated to provide services after the project ends. By considering front-line workers as staff, the project can define clear outputs that need to be produced in the life of the project and develop sustainability strategies for ensuring the sustainability of the impact generated by these outputs, without also having to consider how volunteer services will need to be sustained. A position for Field Implementation Coordinator (FIC) has been created in the three Caritas upazilas to give IPs more direct management of front-lines. In practice, however, the FIC position is mostly filling a program support role related to travel expenses, time sheets, recruitment, and attendance for front-line staff. These functions are usually performed by staff in the partner offices who are responsible for program support, and costs are usually covered by the overhead part of the budget. If a partner organization does not have capacity for this, then the function falls on the Upazila Coordinator, taking her/him away from normal activities, which happens in the two GRAUS Upazilas. The FIC position is actually a better solution to providing administrative support for the front-lines since it gives these administrative support staff access to the field giving them a better understanding of program support needs and the context. 2. Partner Relations. The partnership structure for SAPLING is illustrated in Table 8, and a distinctive characteristic of the SAPLING Project is that in each of the five upazilas, there will be staff from an implementing partner, technical staff from Caritas and technical staff from HKI. In Rowangchari and Thanchi Upazilas, for example, staff from GRAUS, Caritas and HKI will be housed in the same office. In Ruma Upazila, there will be staff from Toymu, Caritas and HKI; and in Bandarban Sadar, there will be staff from Tahzingdong, Caritas and HKI. In Lama Upazila, the upazila with the largest number of project participants, there will be staff from Toymu, Tahzingdong, Caritas and HKI. With so many partners working in the same office at the upazila and district levels, there is a risk that staff will associate with their organization more than with the project. Apparently, this was the case initially when the project began, and project management stressed the need to recognize association Table 8: Partner Roles in Implementing the SAPLING Project

Partner Function Technical or Implementation Role Overall Program Strategy, Financial Management, Commodity Management & Knowledge Management Helen Keller Consortium Technical Coordination for Purpose 1 Food & Income, Purpose 2 International Lead MCHN, and Cross-Cutting Themes of Gender, Youth (HKI) Engagement & Environment Day-to-day operations support for GRAUS in Rowangchari and Thanchi Catholic Relief Consortium Technical Coordination for Purpose 3 DRM, WASH, Local Services (CRS) Partner Capacity Building & SILC Consortium Management of implementation in Ruma, Lama and Bandarban Caritas Partner Sadar Technical WorldFish Partner Technical Coordination for Aquaculture Direct implementation in Bandarban Sadar Upazila and part of TAHZINGDONG Local Partner Lama Upazila (the three unions of Aziznagar, Fitong, Fishakhali and Lama Pouroshava) Direct implementation in Ruma Upazila and part of Lama Upazila TOYMU Local Partner (the four unions of Gazalia, Lama Sadar, Raposhipara and Sarai) GRAUS Local Partner Direct implementation in Rowangchari and Thanch Upazilas

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 with the project rather than with the parent organization. The identification with the project improved for a while, but the MTE observed that there is still strong organizational affiliation superseding project affiliation that is still affecting partner relations, particularly at the upazila level. One partner is associated with a specific technical area, and there is a wide disparity in salaries at the upazila level, with, for example, some TOs from HKI getting paid substantially more than what an Upazila Coordinator from either GRAUS or Caritas is receiving. Despite these tensions, project activities are still being planned and implemented. 3. Collaborative Learning and Action. Collaborative learning and action refers to bringing new knowledge into the project to enhance impact or improve efficiency, using M&E systems for reporting and adaptive management, and capturing, documenting and disseminating knowledge out, including lessons learned, best practices and research findings. Knowledge In. In terms of bringing new knowledge into the project, the engagement of World Fish is bringing in new technical knowledge on aquaculture and the regulations around capture fisheries. The project has also engaged the University of Dhaka for geo-spatial mapping. The project has undertaken a number of formative research activities including a Barrier Analysis on Exclusive Breast Feeding and Complementary Feeding for children 6 to 23 months, Identification of Nutrients Gap among young children of three* ethnic groups, a WASH Hardware Assessment, a Value Chain and Market Governance Assessment, and the about to be completed Qualitative Research to identify cultural factors that are affecting project implementation. Monitoring & Evaluation. Like all Title II Projects, SAPLING has to cope with meeting the demands of USAID/FFP for information on required indicators. Table 9 shows that over 60% of the performance indicators that SAPLING is currently monitoring are required indicators25. While some of the required indicators are useful for assessing SAPLING performance, some are not26, but the project still has to collect and process the data for these. Table 9. Performance Indicators in SAPLING

Required Custom M&E Event Total Indicators Indicators Baseline-Endline 32 5 37 Annual Routine Monitoring 15 13 28 Monitoring Routine Participant Survey 9 17 26 Total 56 35 91

Compared to other Title II Projects in Bangladesh and elsewhere, SAPLING is actually doing fairly well in generating information from its M&E systems for reporting. While not perfect, data quality is reasonably good for output monitoring indicators, with data quality checks starting to be put in place. The jury is still out, however, on the quality of the baseline and annual survey quantitative data. The transition to STREAM will be completed soon, and the M&E systems are starting producing information for decision-makers. The DAP described below is the primary tool for doing this. The M&E system is not perfect, and the M&E unit imposes a lot of work on implementation staff, but after STREAM becomes fully functional the workload is expected to fall to a more manageable level. The biggest problem with making the transition to STREAM has been problems with CHSWs keeping registry books up to date. If recommendations to convert CHSWs to staff and give them more compensation are

25 This information comes from the orientation to the project that was provided to the MTE, but the number of indicators presented, 91, differs from the number shown in the last approved logical framework, 100. 26 Complicated gross margin indicators, for example, seem irrelevant for a project promoting homestead gardening. Increasing Yields and cash income are less important for SAPLING than getting homestead gardens established and producing nutrient dense food crops.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 implemented, the skill levels of CHSWs should increase and the quality of record-keeping should improve. Having a functional M&E unit with strong capacity carries the risk that implementation staff may say “M&E is the responsibility of the M&E unit….it’s not my job”, and this is happening to some extent in SAPLING. When information is needed, requests are made to M&E staff to obtain the information from the database. In the best projects, decision-makers at all levels from front-lines to the CoP are able to obtain the information that they need from the project’s M&E systems to be able to make good adaptive management decisions. The M&E unit is responsible for maintaining the databases and generating monitoring reports, but decision-makers are able to access the project database themselves to get the additional, detailed information that they need for decision-making, rather than having to depend on M&E staff to get the information for them. Project monitoring begins with development of clear implementation plans. The development of the DAP with targets and achievements disaggregated to the union is a good implementation planning and monitoring tool. The MTE team heard many complaints, however, that implementation of the DAP is disrupted by unplanned activities imposed from above. Some of these are inevitable, e.g., the donor wants to know something. Some of these are from the M&E unit. In fact, the M&E unit has its own DAP, but responsibilities for implementing M&E activities by Union Supervisors, for example, do not appear in the Union-level DAP. Thus, when Union Supervisors are asked to do something on M&E that has actually been planned, it looks like activities being imposed outside the DAP. The DAP is pretty good tool for monitoring output production. The MTE observed, however, that there seems to be not enough output quality monitoring, e.g., monitoring the quality of the training provided. Some of this is done through field visits by Union Supervisors, TOs and M&E officers, but they do not have enough time now to get to the field much. The recommendation on recruiting more Union Supervisors will reduce the number of direct reports making it easier to get to the field more often and the recommendation coming up under finance will give TOs more time for technical support. Outcome monitoring will be done by the Routine Participant Survey conducted annually. Knowledge Out. A monthly project newsletter is available electronically for staff and stakeholders, and six issues have been compiled. A Knowledge Management Portal is being created and linked to STREAM which will be accessible by project staff. A website for disseminating information has been constructed but is not yet live. Since these activities are only getting underway, the MTE has no specific recommendations at this time. There is one suggestion, however, and that is that as the project moves forward with communicating with the outside world about SAPLING, it would be good to try to highlight cultural and environmental features of the CHT to generate more appreciation and pride among Bangladeshis for the CHT. 4. Cross-Purpose Integration. Cross-purpose integration is about how well a project is coordinating across purposes to achieve impact. The SAPLING Project is fairly tubular, or siloed, by purpose and planning. Even at the front-lines within a purpose, the project is fairly tubular. IEHFP groups, IGA groups and SILC groups may include the same participants, but the formation of these groups has been independent of each other, not strategic. Priority Recommendation #13 on DAP effectiveness proposes a mechanism for addressing this. 5. Coordination and Collaboration. The project has participated in Upazila and District Coordination meetings with the GoB. Relations have also been developed with various other institutions, e.g., Dhaka University, Bangladesh Red Crescent Society, Fire Service and Civil Defense and the Soil Research and Development Institute (SRDI). 4. Financial Management Systems. The current LoA cash budget for the SAPLING Project is projected at US$ 25,295,166, including US$ 16,850,041 in monetization proceeds, US$ 8,345,125 in 202e funding, and US$ 100,000 for Inland Transport Storage and Handling for monetized commodities. The projected

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 total Cost & Freight value of monetized commodities was US$ 20,331,875 making the total cost of the SAPLING Project to FFP to be US$ 28,777,000. The estimated amount of monetization proceeds cited above is accurate since the price for monetization transactions are fixed by the HCA with the GoB who are the buyers of the monetized wheat. The fixed rate is 85% of the C&F value of the wheat, with the GoB taking 2.125% from the proceeds to cover its monetization-related expenses, bringing the actual cost recovery rate down to 82.875% which is normally quite acceptable compared to past experience worldwide with Title II monetization. The costs of monetization, including the lost value related to the cost recovery on commodities, projected to be around US$3.5 million, and the staff resources used to manage monetization processes, are still substantial. While it would not be simple to re-allocate resources budgeted by the US government for monetization, from the program’s perspective, greater impact could be generated if equivalent cash resources were made available in place of the monetization. Annex C contains a summary table of financial resources showing a burn rate through June 2018 of 44.7%. The targeted burn rate for this point in the project life is 55%, so the project is currently underspending. SAPLING is underspent mainly because of the delay in the signing of the HCA leading to delay in first cash transfer of monetization proceeds, the suspension of project activities in 2017, and the transition in front-line implementation modalities in 2017 and 2018. Of the total current cash budget of $25.3 million, HKI manages 73% of the budget, Caritas (including Tahzingdong and Toymu sub-grants) manages 16%, CRS has 6% of the budget, GRAUS has 4%, and World Fish has 1%. SAPLING is a comparatively top-heavy budget with most of the budget going to HKI for technical support costs associated with the technical role that HKI has as well as significant implementation budgets, even though HKI is not directly implementing the project anywhere. If front- lines were adequately supported, this might not be a problem, but front-lines are not being supported well enough as described earlier. The MTE observed that planned activities in SAPLING are occasionally postponed because funds are not available to implement the activities. As described earlier, technical officers have to prepare and submit procurement requests for trainings and such. The procurement approval process has to go all of the way to Dhaka for approval and takes time. Another challenge in the field has been finding vendors willing to work with SAPLING payment process and the GoB VAT tax process, but progress has been made on this. Where a vendor is not available, however, then a cash advance needs to be made to a staff member. When the transfer is made to a staff member’s account, there are bank transfer fees charged when the amount exceeds 1 lakh. One final finance observation made by the MTE is that staff at the front-lines are receiving lower salaries in SAPLING then they would if they were working in the same position in other projects within their organization. No one has dictated salary levels to partners in SAPLING. However, bottom-line budgets (called “LoA”) have been fixed by HKI so partners have to make adjustments themselves to fit within the budgets, and one of the things that suffers is staff salaries. 5. Commodity Management Systems. Monetization of soft, white winter wheat generates two-thirds of SAPLING funding. As of September 2018, the project has fully monetized its revised LoA level of commodities at 57,290 metric tons (MT) as compared to the original proposed amount of 60,260 MT with a total cost and freight value of $20,331,875. The approved LoA level of commodities was reduced because of the procurement cost of the commodities. The cost and freight value of the revised LoA commodity is $20,355,77327 which is almost equal to the value of original level of LoA commodity at the time of approval.

27 Modification Number 9 to USAID Award to HKI – AID-FFP-A-15-00010 Dated 27th February 2018

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

Four call forwards were processed for the import of the total of 57,290 MT which arrived in country in eight shipments between FY 2015 and FY 2018. The GoB is the buyer of the commodity, and the HCA between MoCHTA and HKI stipulates a sales price of 85% of the cost and freight value of the commodities. The GoB has paid $16,869,84628 in equivalent local currency for the 57,290 MT wheat received. The GoB deducts 2.125% from the sales proceeds to cover its own transport, storage and handlings costs, so the actual cost recovery for SAPLING is 82.875%. Annex C contains tables showing a commodity summary by fiscal year, a commodity loss summary and a monetization costs recovery summary by fiscal year. This is the first experience that HKI Bangladesh has gained from a monetization process, and the monetization has proceeded reasonably smoothly. The call forwards have met Bellmon Analyses conditions, including no disruption on local production, no disincentive on local market, and no transport, storage and handling problems in country due to the import of wheat. There are no reports of inland or ocean loss from the shipments of the commodity. The call forwards were timely and no pipeline break was reported. FFP combined commodity procurement for all three Title II projects in Bangladesh which worked well. The only problems occurred when Title II commodities were shipped with commercial cargo destined for Bangladesh. The GoB Ministry of Food would not take delivery of Title II commodities until the commercial cargo had been offloaded completely. 6. Human Resource Management Systems. Staff turnover rates are relatively normal for HKI, somewhat higher for Caritas, but problematically higher for IPs, especially at the front-lines with CHSWs. The workload, as discussed previously, is a major contributor to the problem at the upazila and union levels. Both workload and salary are problems at the front-lines. Morale is generally okay in the project, but not great. A number of people interviewed said that they were interested in working for SAPLING because of the new skills and knowledge they acquire, but they will likely depart for better opportunities whenever the opportunity arises. The MTE observed a notable lack of appreciation in the project for the front-lines. Volunteers in remote areas have to pay out of pocket expenses to do their work for travel and lodging. Staff have had to take salary cuts to join the project, e.g., to go from being a Caritas staff to becoming an IP staff. As mentioned, within the same IP comparing salaries at the same position but in different projects, SAPLING salaries are lower, although the complexity of the job is generally greater. The project doesn’t provide lunch when staff are traveling for a whole day to attend a project event like a learning and sharing meeting. If front-line workers are not happy and satisfied in their jobs, the project will suffer. There is a large disparity between the compensation levels for different front-line staff, e.g., FFs versus CHSWs and SILC Agents. This is partly explained by the staff versus volunteer distinction which needs to be changed as per earlier recommendation, but the bottom-line is that CHSWs and SILC Agents are undercompensated for the work they do. 7. Materials & Equipment Management Systems. The MTE observed no major issues relative to procurement of materials and equipment in SAPLING, except complaints about the procurement of seed for distribution. If the priority recommendation to move to conditional cash transfers is made, then this constraint will be eliminated. The only other administrative support issue that arose during the MTE was related to the request for a boat for Thanchi to facilitate staff transport, an issue that SAPLING management is already working with staff to address. IV. MAJOR THEMES FOR THE REMAINING LIFE OF SAPLING The SAPLING MTE has identified a short-list of fourteen high priority recommendations for the remaining life of the project. These have been organized into four themes, and the project is encouraged to focus not only on the priority commendations described below but also on any other actions that can

28 Total sales price calculated for 57,290 MT as shown in Table C-4 in Annex C.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 be taken in support of the themes. The major observations supporting each recommendation are provided along with suggestions from the MTE on ways to operationalize each recommendation. A. THEME A: Strategic Thinking Because of various factors delaying the start-up of SAPLING Project activities, the project has only really gotten fully underway in the last six months. It is therefore somewhat early to be revising project strategies that have not been fully tested on the ground. Nevertheless, the MTE found some areas that require strategic thinking or revision now in order to be able to achieve significant impact in the remaining life of SAPLING. 1. Recommendation #1: Strategy for the Remote Highland Areas. There appears to be two distinct livelihoods zones in the five upazilas in which the SAPLING project is being implemented. One of these is the remote highland areas in which livelihoods are oriented around jhum cultivation, basic services are limited or non-existent, and cultural barriers to behavioral change are very entrenched. The second is the “flatter” areas, like most of Lama Upazila and parts of Bandarban Sadar Upazila, for example, in which jhum has been replaced by commercial crop production and extensive day labor for poor households. The SAPLING strategy as it looks now will have less impact on food security/nutrition/resilience in the more remote areas. Homestead production in the remote areas is such a small part of the livelihood strategies for producing food and generating income. Jhum cultivation is the primary source of food, including horticulture production, and income for households in these areas, and there is a perceived high opportunity cost for them to shift resources away from jhum toward homestead cultivation. The jhum cultivation itself is not sustainable. Increasing population density is reducing the fallow period between cultivation on a particular piece of land so productivity is declining. Farmers have started using fertilizers to address this constraint, but this reduces their margins. Jhum farmers could be exposed to long term sustainable alternative land use practices, such as integrated tree crop/perennials production, as one option. The project should also seek out those researchers who are working on modifying jhum cultivation to make it more sustainable and engage with them. Until alternatives are practiced, the resilience of jhum-dependent farmers, an element of the goal of SAPLING, will always be threatened. Finally, because very few development projects have worked in the more remote highland areas, cultural beliefs and barriers to the behavioral change promoted by SAPLING are very firmly entrenched. The techniques developed in the plain lands for promoting behavioral change may not be as effective to induce the desired change, and more intensive SBCC approaches are likely to be required.

RECOMMENDATION #1 STRATEGY FOR THE REMOTE HIGHLAND AREAS ADAPT THE SAPLING STRATEGY TO BE MORE APPROPRIATE FOR THE REMOTE HIGHLAND AREAS

The adaptation of the SAPLING strategy for the remote highlands can utilize the normal process for project design, beginning with a ToC. The Project should undertake a ToC process targeting impact on food security, nutrition, or resilience for a significant impact group in the highland areas, such as vulnerable households who depend on jhum cultivation. This means understanding and using the concepts presented in the Resilience Research that was done for the project and using the formative analysis recently completed by the project to inform a redesign of messages and approaches along the pathways identified by the new ToC. The project should engage researchers and CHT specialists from

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 universities, research stations and other sources to provide guidance during and after the strategy design process.

Strategy for the Remote Highlands If the Two-Year Extension is Not Approved… Since SAPLING is already planning to undertake a review of its ToC, this opportunity should be used to adapt parts of the project strategy to make it more appropriate for the remote highland areas, particularly under Purpose 1 to focus more on jhum cultivation and under Purpose 2 to contextualize the messages to address the unique barriers to behavioral change that have been identified by the qualitative research.

2. Recommendation #2: Expand the Focus on Income Generation. SAPLING’s current on- and off- farm IGAs are heavily biased toward agriculture (i.e., papaya, banana, ginger, turmeric, pumpkin, livestock health workers, coffee), with only two non-farm IGAs identified – WASH and weaving. Thus, participants’ IGAs remain largely vulnerable to climate risks, i.e., risks associated with extreme weather events such as drought and floods, as well as climate change and variability more broadly. Although livelihoods diversification can help households spread risk, potentially buffering them from unexpected shocks or stresses, diversification in terms of the total number of livelihoods activities in which a household engages does not necessarily translate into accumulated household wealth and ultimately, a pathway out of poverty.29 Multiple, low return livelihoods activities can allow households to temporarily deal with a shock or stress, but are primarily a means of survival rather than contributing to longer-term accumulation of income and/or assets. Thus, a household’s total number of livelihoods activities is not necessarily what contributes to their resilience. Rather, household resilience capacity is more closely related to multiple livelihoods that are diversified across different risk profiles. That is, such diversification strengthens the capacity of households to deal with and recover from shocks and stresses, providing the most effective buffer against future unpredictability.30 In addition, there is currently limited opportunity for households to actually diversify their livelihoods through SAPLING activities. Participation in a commercial crop IGA group is contingent upon a household already growing (or having grown within the last three years) the targeted IGA crop. While this might help increase household income overall through increased productivity, it does not necessarily reflect diversification, and in particular diversification across livelihoods risk profiles. Two obvious areas for expansion are aquaculture and poultry, although like crops, both are vulnerable to certain climate risks. Fish ponds are common throughout the SAPLING project area. As a pilot activity, program implementation around fisheries are limited to only two upazilas, with a considerably heavier concentration in Lama (514 participants) than Rowangchari (116 participants). Expanding aquaculture activities to additional upazilas as well as within Rowangchari provides the opportunity for generating income not only from fish, but also potentially from raising fingerlings in fish nurseries, fish- based products, fish inputs, and rearing other relevant species such as frogs, crabs and eels. This would require renewing the contract, or developing a new one, with the WorldFish Center for the remaining LoA.

29 Nelson S, T Frankenberger, M Langworthy, T Finan and T Bower. 2016. The effect of livelihood diversity on recovery and shock impact in Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda. Technical Report Series No 2: Strengthening the Evidence Base for Resilience in the Horn of Africa. Nairobi: A joint International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and TANGO International publication. 30 Béné C, T Frankenberger and S Nelson. 2015. Design, Monitoring and Evaluation of Resilience Interventions: Conceptual and Empirical Considerations. IDS Working Paper. Volume 2015 No. 459. London: Institute of Development Studies.

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Poultry rearing is fairly common in the SAPLING project area as well, ranging from approximately 40% of households overall, but as high as 57% and 63% of households in Thanchi and Ruma, respectively, based on information from the project’s household census31. Interviews conducted as part of the MTE suggest there is high demand for local sources of poultry stock, particularly local breeds, which have higher market value than improved poultry breeds. High demand for local sources of poultry, coupled with SAPLING’s activities promoting livestock health workers and poultry as an animal-sourced food, suggest poultry rearing may be a suitable IGA for SAPLING. A third area for potential expansion is beekeeping for honey production. SAPLING incorporated beekeepers from the Rural Livelihoods and Climate Change Adaptation in the Himalaya (Himalica) Project into its IGA portfolio during the second quarter of FY2018. As part of its IGA focus, SAPLING provided training to strengthen the skills of the beekeepers co-opted from Himalica at the request of MoCHTA. However, the project is not offering beekeeping to IEHFP group members as an additional IGA opportunity. Rather than provide training on hand pollination for gourds, cucumbers, pumpkin, and sweet gourds through its IEHFP or IGA sessions, SAPLING should expand training and IGA opportunities in beekeeping. Not only can the Himalica beekeepers serve as trainers or mentors, but beekeeping activities can be paired with IEHFP and IGA sessions to improve fruit set – and therefore production – in homestead gardens or commercial crops. Lastly, IGA group members are predominantly women, since they have been selected from IEHFP groups, which are 98% women. Women’s participation in income-generating activities supports SAPLING’s goals around increasing women’s access to income and financial services, as well as strengthening their role in household decision-making. However, men tend to be the primary cash crop producers within a household. Thus, SAPLING should engage more men from participating households in its IGA groups, while maintaining high levels of participation by women through an expanded palette of potential IGAs. Operationalizing such a shift could be facilitated through a combined approach that includes continuing to promote SAPLING’s pre-determined IGAs while also building the capacities of participants in the selection, planning, and management of IGAs – particularly non-farm IGAs – so that they can develop their own context-specific income-generating opportunities beyond those offered through the project, e.g., sewing, beading, repair/maintenance of water infrastructure, solar products. The best opportunities for generating income in one village might differ markedly from the best options in another village. Thus, building the capacities of participants to develop their own IGAs, including basic financial analysis and activity or business plans, in response to local or niche opportunities that may not be relevant across the entire program area provides them with the skills to adapt to changing conditions over the long- term.

RECOMMENDATION #2 EXPAND THE FOCUS ON INCOME GENERATION REVISE AND EXPAND THE PROJECT STRATEGY FOR PROMOTING IGAS, PARTICULARLY FOR NON-FARM OPPORTUNITIES

Different types of income-generating activities may be more appropriate for men or women based on their own strengths and limitations, including their physical abilities, thereby reducing perceived “competition” within the household. For example, women FGD participants valued IGAs that allow

31These data were collected prior to the floods and landslides during the summer of 2017 and may therefore have changed, though interest likely remains high.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 them to work from home such as weaving, sewing, and beading, enabling them to earn income while still dealing with various household responsibilities. At the same time, some women are involved with commercial crops such as banana, both solely or jointly with their husbands. In contrast, IGAs that require great physical strength or time spent away from the homestead, including traveling to markets, may be more culturally appropriate for men in the CHT context. The household approach utilized by SAPLING would suggest matching IGA activities to the most interested member of the participating household, supporting both men and women to generate household income. Expanding the Focus on Income- Generation If the Two-Year Extension The ability to identify and develop plans for a successful is Not Approved… IGA would not only further support women’s engagement in generating household income and If a two-year extension is not approved, decision-making within the household, but would also there will be limited time to undertake any sort of processes, like a value chain analysis, expand the role of men in generating household income to identify new IGA opportunities, without marginalizing them at the expense of women’s particularly for non-farm opportunities. In increased “empowerment”. In particular, such skills the remaining life, the project should build contribute to longer-term sustainability as households on the experience already acquired with would not be dependent on SAPLING for identifying aquaculture, poultry, and the agricultural potential IGAs after the program ends. As part of the sub-sectors identified, engage more men in expanded focus on IGAs, SAPLING should facilitate IGA activities, and facilitate access to SILC access of IGA members to its SILC activities so that for IGA participants. they will have a community-based source of capital for reinvesting in – or developing new – IGAs. 3. Recommendation #3: Thinking Sustainably. While again the project has only been undertaking full implementation for a relatively short period, the overall impression with the MTE team is that SAPLING is not thinking enough now about sustainable impact. This is not something that can be pushed back to later in the life of the activity. Creating sustainable impact must be at the forefront of all project strategies and approaches right from the beginning of the project, since the way the project operates will set the stage for creating sustainable impact. “Thinking sustainably” means always thinking about how the project delivers activities from the very beginning, i.e., addressing the key question of whether there a way to implement an activity that will increase the likelihood that impact will be sustained after the project ends.

RECOMMENDATION #3 THINKING SUSTAINABLY EXPAND CAPACITIES IN THE PROJECT AT ALL LEVELS FOR THINKING SUSTAINABLY

Implementing this recommendation begins with building staff capacities to understand and apply the concepts described in the FFP resource: Sustaining Development: A Synthesis of Results from a Four-Country Study of Sustainability and Exit Strategies among Development Food Assistance Projects32. In this resource, the key factors for ensuring sustainable impact are:

32 “Sustaining Development: A Synthesis of Results from a Four-Country Study of Sustainability and Exit Strategies among Development Food Assistance Projects”, Beatrice Lorge Rogers & Jennifer Coates, Gerald J. and Dorothy R. Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Tufts University, December 2015

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• Ensuring that resources required to sustain impact are available after the project ends • Ensuring that technical and managerial capacities are in place to sustain impact after the project ends • Ensuring that stakeholders required to sustain impact after the project ends are motivated to do so • Ensuring that relationships required to sustain impact after the project ends are fully functional A second key step in implementing this recommendation to be thinking sustainably is to develop post- project visions for some of the key interventions being supported by the project. For example, what does the Thinking Sustainably If the Two- project expect LC Leaders to be doing after the project Year Extension is Not Approved… ends? Similarly, what are IGA groups, Marketing This recommendation is critical to Committees, SILC Groups, SILC agents, GMP service ensuring that the project achieves providers, and UDMCs expected to be doing after the sustainable impact and should be fully project ends? A long-term vision for these entities will implemented in the remaining life of the facilitate analysis to identify what resources, technical project. capacities, managerial capacities, relationships and motivation are required to enable them to fulfill the vision. B. THEME B: Implementation Quality The SAPLING project has begun implementing a number of approaches that appear to be sound for the most part. While few of these have been fully implemented, there are some positive signs that intended outcomes are likely to result. There are some approaches, however, that need significant attention now to become more effective in achieving outcomes and impact. 1. Recommendation #4: Accelerate Implementation of Marketing Strategies. As noted above, virtually no marketing activities had been implemented as of the MTE. It is imperative that SAPLING accelerate implementation of its marketing strategies over the remaining LoA. In particular, the project must provide leadership in the form of a management position for its marketing and value chains activities. SAPLING’s well-intended and on-going attempts to recruit someone for this position are acknowledged, the continuing lack of programmatic oversight has resulted in delays in formulating and implementing a detailed marketing strategy for the project, including formation of MCs, establishing aggregation points, developing linkages to sellers, brokers, and middlemen, and promoting post-harvest processing and value-added products. Some participants have already reported being unable to successfully sell what they produced (e.g., bananas, papayas, pumpkin), due in large part to a lack of market linkages. Without an acceleration and expansion of marketing activities over the remaining LOA, SAPLING risks failing to achieve expected outcomes related to – and dependent on – building households’ resilience capacity through increased access to markets, income, aspirations, and locus of control.

RECOMMENDATION #4 MARKETING ACCELERATE IMPLEMENTATION OF MARKETING STRATEGIES.

One of the solutions SAPLING envisioned to help address women not being allowed to travel outside of their para or conduct business with non-family males was to form MCs or farm business leaders’ groups. According to their livelihoods strategy, participation in one or both of these groups would allow women to develop stronger market linkages and increased access to markets. Removing barriers to markets and building negotiation, mediation, aggregation and general business skills of women will lead to their increased profits from commercial and homestead production activities.

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LC leaders provide advice on market-oriented crop production and establish relationships with different market traders in order to link them with group members. As a way to jump-start its marketing activities, SAPLING should train LC leaders to be collectors (farias) as part of helping them develop linkages to middlemen (e.g., paikers), wholesalers, and retailers. Commissions from sales will provide motivation, which will in turn, contribute to longer-term sustainability. Currently, SAPLING IGA group members lack not only access to, but negotiating powers with paikers, who set prices, timing of collections, and other conditions of sales. Building the capacities of LC leaders and group members to negotiate directly with paikers for the best prices and other marketing conditions will facilitate women’s engagement in markets and ability to earn income, particularly for producers with small crop surpluses. For women, access to and engagement in markets is a critical pathway to increased decision-making within the household. Ultimately, women’s Marketing If the Two-Year Extension is engagement in earning income and household Not Approved… decisions around how it is spent contributes to It is rather late in the project life to be forming better household well-being. As women increase new groups such as marketing committees, that production and engage in markets, their income will be fully functional and self-sustaining in the increases, which allows them more control over less than two years remaining in the life of the productive assets as well as decision-making. As project. In its remaining life, the project should their success grows, so too does their confidence not attempt to establish marketing committees but should focus on building the capacities of and belief in themselves. Self-efficacy and a sense of learning center leaders to be market brokers control over one’s life are important aspects of (like farias) and linking them to the existing resilience capacity; as people’s aspirations and marketing systems, i.e., paikers, just as HKI has confidence grow, so too does their ability and done in previous Title II projects. willingness to make investments, such as expanding or starting new businesses, paying for their children’s education, or investing in other assets (e.g., land, livestock). 2. Recommendation #5: Conditional Cash Transfers. IEHFP and IGA group participants receive input support in the form of an asset transfer. As of the MTE, IEHFP participants had received several seasonal transfers of seed. However, based on data collected in FGDs during the MTE, individual preferences, low quality seed, and more pressing needs appear to limit the effectiveness of seed distributions in either IEHFP or IGA activities. An IGA group member who is already growing the IGA crop targeted in his/her para may need tools or other inputs more than additional seeds or seedlings of the IGA crop s/he is already growing. For IEHFP group members, seed distributions of pre-determined varieties remove choice from participants, in terms of what crops they might grow or sell, as well as what type of IGA they might invest in.

RECOMMENDATION #5 CONDITIONAL CASH TRANSFERS SHIFT TO A CONDITIONAL CASH TRANSFER MODEL FOR INPUT SUPPORT TO BOTH IEHFP AND IGA GROUPS

With an expanded focus on IGAs and strengthened capacity of participants to develop their own context-specific types of IGAs (see above), providing a cash transfer rather than in-kind allows participants to self-determine how best to invest that asset, for example to reinvest in a SAPLING targeted IGA crop, to rent land, or to invest in some other productive asset or activity (e.g., beekeeping,

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 boat transport, threshing machine). This will enable participants to undertake productive activities that capitalize on their individual interests and comparative advantage. As a conditional cash transfer, IEHFP and IGA group members must develop an “activity” or small business plan for their IGA, including sources of inputs, labor needs and sources, marketing plans, and projected prices. SAPLING currently uses such an approach in its IGA sessions, which could be applied to IEHFP group sessions. It may also be possible to combine the groups for the relevant training sessions, given that IGA group participants are currently pulled from IEHFP groups. A pre-condition for both IEHFP and IGA members is attendance in sessions on nutrient-rich crops, as well as the training on selection, planning, and management of an IGA. Members of both groups must complete an activity plan in order to receive the cash transfer. For IEHFP group members, an additional condition for the cash transfer is production of a nutrient-rich crop for household consumption, which could include fruits, vegetables or animal products.

Conditional Cash Transfers If the Two-Year Extension is Not Approved… It is not possible in the remaining life of SAPLING to undertake a complete capacity-building process for building participant capacities for good selection, planning and management of IGAs. The project should, however, develop a process for building basic IGA planning capacities and proceed with implementing a conditional cash transfer process in which the condition for receiving a cash grant is development of an individual IGA business plan.

3. Recommendation #6: Focusing Under Purpose 1. Both IEHFP and IGA group members repeatedly and unanimously indicated there were too many training sessions, they lasted too long, and they often disseminated too much information at any one session. Some groups mentioned sessions lasting 3-4 hours. Given that the IEHFP platform is used for other messaging and training sessions beyond just homestead food production, e.g., Nurturing Connections, WASH, and DRM, coupled with the fact that many IEHFP members are also IGA group members which has its own training sessions, it is perhaps not surprising that participants perceived there to be an overabundance of training sessions and/or information being disseminated. Nonetheless, it indicates that they are overwhelmed. There was also a perception that some of the information is too technical, e.g., Trichoderma composting. Participants also agreed that attending the sessions incurred an opportunity cost for them. Most SAPLING participants are day laborers and lose 250-400 BDT/day when they attend a session, regardless of how long the session actually lasts. For example, it may take an hour or more each way to walk to the para center – or wherever a session is held. Thus, even if a session lasts only 1-2 hours, they may lose an entire day of wages. This is particularly problematic during the jhum season, when participants are either working in their own jhum or as a paid laborer in someone else’s jhum. Likewise, FFs observed that it is most difficult for them to schedule trainings during the jhum season, as people are not available at their homesteads. Rather, they may be working in their jhum during the day or have temporarily relocated for the entire jhum season. Thus, FFs often need to make several repeat visits to a para in order to successfully schedule, let alone complete, training sessions during the jhum season. According to the FY2017 Annual Results Report, timing IEHFP training sessions to meet the needs of all members “has been a challenge,” because most SAPLING participants practice jhum cultivation “on lands located a considerable distance from their residence.” To help address this, many of the FFs interviewed during the MTE reported that they have been meeting individually with those who miss sessions, creating considerable extra work.

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RECOMMENDATION #6 FOCUSING UNDER PURPOSE 1 REVIEW THE CURRICULUM FOR PURPOSE 1 TO DELIVER FEWER, MORE STREAMLINED AND EFFECTIVE SESSIONS

For the remaining LOA, SAPLING should focus both its IEHFP and IGA trainings on key take-away messages to deliver fewer, more streamlined sessions. This will require a review and revision of the IEHFP and IGA curricula to eliminate some technical approaches and simplify others. At the same time, SAPLING should review the appropriateness – as well as veracity – of some of its information. For example, are pheromone traps – or the ingredients to make them – readily available throughout the SAPLING project area? Are they affordable? Are they available for the specific insect pests and crops grown by SAPLING participants? If available in the markets, can participants in more remote areas access them? Additionally, there is little benefit to IEHFP group members in conducting purity tests of their seeds, unless they plan on entering the national market for certified, organic, or foundation seed, in which case there are a multitude of additional rules and regulations by which they would also need to abide. For local markets, such tests are most likely not necessary. Removing debris, weed seeds, damaged or broken seeds should be sufficient. For germination testing, HKI promotes using global standards of 100 seeds, but this is likely unnecessary for SAPLING participants for whom using 100 seeds may be more wasteful than useful as a germination test. For home gardeners, tests can be adequately conducted with as few as 25 seeds of most crop types, especially if the seed has been well cleaned of debris and unfilled or damaged seeds.33 Finally, seeds should never be exposed to sunlight any more than absolutely necessary, which is counter to some information provided in the IEHFP We Can Grow! Manual (see pages 157-158). In shifting to fewer more focused sessions, SAPLING should also shift from sit-down Focusing Under Purpose 1 If the Two-Year discussion-style sessions to more hands-on, Extension is Not Approved… experiential learning in mini-plots with It is important that the project take the experiments at LCs and in farmers’ jhum, ponds, opportunity now to implement as much of this and homesteads. As much as possible, training recommendation as possible with the focus to sessions should be shortened to no more than deliver fewer, more streamlined and effective two hours maximum, and sessions should be sessions, especially given the short time limited during the peak work periods in the jhum remaining in the project life if the two-year season. During jhum, field visits can be extension is not approved. conducted for follow-up and monitoring to bring learning to the farmer. 4. Recommendation #7: CHSW Capacities. The CHSWs play a pivotal role for achieving outcomes of Purpose 2 interventions and therefore it is critical that SAPLING focus on enhancing the skills and capacities of the CHSWs and thus enhance their performance. Following on from the earlier description of the gaps in the CHSW’s work outcome and quality, the MTE recommends that significant attention be given to enhancing the performance of CHSWs.

33 Very small-seeded varieties, such as red amaranth, can be tested by estimating the percentage of germination in an area sown with seeds.

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RECOMMENDATION #7 CHSW CAPACITIES ENHANCE THE PERFORMANCE OF COMMUNITY HEALTH SERVICE WORKERS

The first step in implementing this recommendation is to convert CHSWs to staff rather than volunteers and increase their salaries to levels that would be commensurate with a similar staff position in the field and would acknowledge their time spent at work and their efforts. This should also include benefits available to other field staff and cover travel to paras which require half a day or more for travel. This action should be uniform across all IPs. A second step is to provide the CHSWs with ongoing supportive supervision focused on problem solving. A structured refresher training would include topics which need reiteration or new topics as identified through field reviews, formative research or MIS analysis. This needs to be provided on a periodic (six monthly) basis. This could be either in the form of on-the-job training to improve performance related to understanding her work better, address the varying needs of the hilly terrain and plains, listening and interacting with participants and on-site problem-solving, or follow a structured curriculum. In order to further strengthen their performance, the CHSWs need retraining in key technical areas. One of these is GMP – focusing on appropriately interpreting the child’s weight in terms of where it lies in the color bands in the growth chart, what it means for its nutritional status and seeking out appropriate medical care. A second key technical area is pregnancy identification. As mentioned earlier, a woman participant in SAPLING is registered as pregnant only after she has been identified as such by a skilled provider (physician, nurse, FWV, or midwife). A CHSW can be trained to identify a pregnant woman. Most NGOS with field programs have successfully done so, and SAPLING should be no exception. This will also save time during which the pregnant woman can get required care and advise. There are several CHSWs who have been trained as CSBAs under the earlier UNDP project and who are doing deliveries in the SAPLING project paras. All CHSWs receive lactation management and ENA training and are able to provide individual counseling to mothers on colostrum feeding and early initiation of breastfeeding at delivery. In addition to this, the CHSWs should be trained to provide basic post-natal care, such as observing for fever and/or heavy bleeding and checking on the CHSW Capacities If the Two-Year Extension newborn neonate. They should be trained to is Not Approved… recognize when the mother or neonate need Some elements of this recommendation can be to be referred to a trained provider. This implemented in the remaining life of the project. The would ensure that the woman and her salary issue for CHSWs should certainly be newborn receive the basic care during a critical addressed. There will also be time for one good event, especially in an environment where refresher training for all CHSWs targeting job health care services are not readily available. approach (listening to and counseling participants), some technical areas including GMP, and capacities The project should also develop and implement for CHSWs to identify pregnancies. Supervisors quality assurance guidelines and tools for use should also be re-oriented to providing ongoing during routine supervision by field supervisors. supportive supervision of CHSWs focused on The MCHN TOs should be made responsible problem-solving. The part of the recommendation to for monitoring and assessing the quality of the build the capacities of CHSWs to become fully CHSW’s work on a continuous basis and for functional Community-Based Skilled Birth Attendant using the information to identify gaps in their (CSBAs) should not be implemented since the focus needs to be on delivery of the core messages in the knowledge and skills. This information should remaining life of the project. be used to design the content of the refresher 49

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 trainings to strengthen the quality of the CHSW’s work. Such guidelines already exist in the MOHFW or other projects and can be adapted for use by SAPLING. 5. Recommendation #8: Potable Water Supply. As reported earlier, the WASH strategy is generally on track and the following recommendation is more to sharpen and strengthen its implementation, with a focus on local capacities for maintaining WASH hardware.

RECOMMENDATION #8 POTABLE WATER SUPPLY IN THE 100 PARAS THAT ARE TARGETED FOR WASH (I.E., NO EXPANSION), FOCUS ON STRENGTHENING EXISTING DPHE CAPACITY AND DEVELOPING COMMUNITY- BASED CAPACITIES FOR REPAIR AND MAINTENANCE OF POTABLE WATER HARDWARE.

In the 100 paras that are already targeted by SAPLING, the project should focus on strengthening existing DPHE capacities for repair and maintenance of water hardware and develop community-based capacities for maintenance and repair. In paras with a water source, SAPLING should coordinate with DPHE, WATSAN/WUC for rehabilitation or repair/maintenance of the water supply systems. The strategy would have multiple approaches. In all eleven vulnerable unions, the project should build the capacities of DPHE mechanics who are based in each union by providing them with refresher training on the maintenance or repair of the water supply system. The project should also collaborate with the DPHE to monitor the work of the mechanics. In the remote paras where DPHE mechanics are reluctant to travel, the project should identify people who would be able to do the small repair and maintenance work of the water supply source, so the community does not have to depend on the DPHE mechanics. These people could include masons, for example, or those who work in the bicycle/rickshaw repair shops, and the project should train them to provide repair services for appropriate fees from the community. For the paras in the target unions without water supply source, the focus needs to be on developing capacities of the community for rain water harvesting in collaboration with the DPHE. The WATSANs and WUC will have to coordinate these activities and therefore strengthening the capacities of the local WUCs and union WATSAN becomes critical. They can facilitate the identification of appropriate local people who can provide the repair and maintenance service, facilitate their training and monitor their service. These committees can also monitor the work of the DPHE mechanics in their para and coordinate with the DPHE and SAPLING staff.

Potable Water Supply If the Two-Year Extension is Not Approved… As indicated in the report, the WASH strategy is on track and this recommendation is more to sharpen and strengthen its implementation. With less than two years remaining in the project life if the two-year extension is not approved, the focus should be on ensuring effective implementation of the project’s WASH strategy, including developing community capacities for repair and maintenance of potable water sources. The part of the recommendation on strengthening the DPHE capacities which would require substantial effort and time on the part of the project staff should not be implemented.

6. Recommendation #9: Nurturing Connections. As described earlier, the current implementation of the Nurturing Connections sessions is unlikely to achieve the expected outcomes of empowering women to speak publicly and engage in SAPLING interventions, increase men’s participation in domestic

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 work, and improve intra-household relationships. The Nurturing Connections implementation strategy and plans need to be reviewed and revised.

RECOMMENDATION #9 NURTURING CONNECTIONS REVIEW AND REVISE THE IMPLEMENTATION PLANS FOR THE NURTURING CONNECTIONS INTERVENTION.

The Nurturing Connections training should go through an immediate review. This review would look at (i) the training curriculum and materials, assessing its appropriateness for the hill context and culture; (ii) the capacities, skills and understanding of the CHSWs and FFs who are the front-line trainers and the MCHN TOs who are providing technical support; and (iii) the training roll out plan. The project should conduct a quick assessment of a sample of PLWs, senior women and senior men who have received the Nurturing Connections training to understand which concepts and methods they didn’t like, which concepts were easy to understand and could be related to their own life experiences, and what techniques or methodology they would suggest for improving understanding and contextualizing the messages. Nurturing Connections If the Two- SAPLING’s Qualitative Research has looked at gender Year Extension is Not Approved… division of labor and prescribed gender roles in Bandarban This approach is critical to SAPLING’s by each ethnic group. The review of the Nurturing gender transformation objective, and the Connections should utilize the findings and recommendation should be fully recommendations from this research as well as bring in implemented in the remaining life of the subject experts from within the country to support and project. advise the process. 7. Recommendation #10: Implementation of Risk Reduction Action Plans. The CHT lacks adequate infrastructure, especially feeder roads to facilitate transport of household members during household emergencies and children, elderly and disabled during larger scale emergencies. Potable water is also problematic in more remote locations. Stream drainage systems have the potential to support expanded aquaculture as a secondary livelihood, and construction of market stalls may improve market functions. All of these have been included in one form or another in the RRAPs that have been developed by UDMCs. These plans are a direct result of highly participatory community-driven processes that assess community risks and identify potential strategies to build community, household and individual resilience, so the actions identified reflect the priority needs of communities. In 2018 SAPLING will fund 16 out of the 175 schemes listed in the RRAPs, and the current plan is that SAPLING will support UDMCs to implement other activities in the RRAPs using GoB and other resources. While SAPLING will fund a portion of the RRAP, communities are supposed to identify how to resource their RRAP during plan development, linking to resources from within the community, government and other NGOs. UDMCs may have some control over the limited resources from the community that they may be able to mobilize. The UDMCs need capacity building, however, on the GoB budget planning process and on fund-raising with NGOs or the private sector in order to access resources from these sources. Resources from other sources are critical to implementing RRAP activities since there are limitations on how cash-for-work resources can be used (for construction labor costs, not materials) and when cash- for-work resources can be used (in the dry season). Many of the proposed RRAP activities require

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 skilled labor, which cannot be procured at cash-for-work wages, and construction materials or use of heavy equipment.

RECOMMENDATION #10 RISK REDUCTION ACTION PLANS PROVIDE GUIDANCE AND CAPACITY-BUILDING SUPPORT TO UDMCS FOR MOBILIZING RESOURCES FROM THE GOB, NGOS AND THE PRIVATE SECTOR TO IMPLEMENT ACTIVITIES IN THE RRAP

The GoB budget planning process begins in November and requires submission of a proposed budget to the upazila level by February. SAPLING should organize workshops for UDMC members to increase their knowledge on the steps required for budget planning and submission. Annual dialogues will be held between the UDMC and local Karbari and Headmen regarding the content and significance of the RRAPs, soliciting their support to advocate for funding from the local government. Similarly, UDMCs should meet with authorities from relevant local government offices including the Department of Agriculture Extension, DPHE, Department of Livestock Services, the Department of Fisheries, the Water Development Board, and the Department of Local Government and Rural Development, to advocate that earmarked development resources be allocated for RRAP implementation in the upazila. Accessing private sector or NGO funding requires good fund-raising skills, including micro-project design, proposal development, and communications skills. SAPLING should build Risk Reduction Action Plans If the Two-Year Extension is Not Approved… the capacities of UDMCs to be able to identify appropriate, small-scale projects from their If the two-year extension is not approved, SAPLING RRAPs that will be of interest to NGOs or should focus in its remaining life on making the most private sector donors. The project should also effective use of cash-for-work resources to support provide information to the UDMCs on the RRAP implementation and work toward integrating availability of funding from different sources, RRAPs into the GoB planning and budgeting processes. There is not enough time to also build including small projects funds from various capacities of UDMCs to mobilize resources from donors or NGOs, embassy development funds, other non-GoB sources, such as the private sector private sector social development funds, and or NGOs. private foundations. SAPLING should then build capacities of UDMCs to develop, submit and follow-up on proposals for funding. C. THEME C: Organizational Structure Even the most well-designed project can fail if the project delivery structure does not facilitate effective and efficient implementation. The current structure of the SAPLING Project is a function of the various transitions that SAPLING has undergone up to now. With the two-year extension that is being proposed, there is time now to undertake another transition that will enable the project to address inefficiencies in project planning and monitoring as well as some partner relations issues. 1. Recommendation #11: District Coordinator. As already reported under the management observations, there is no one position in Bandarban District that is responsible for project coordination, representation, and strategic vision for the project. In some cases, this would not be a problem if the CoP were able to spend significant time in the project area. This is not possible in the SAPLING project, however, because of the rigorous review and approval processes required for expatriates to enter the

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

CHT. A senior position is needed within Bandarban District to be able to promote and reinforce the project vision with staff and stakeholders. In many interviews, staff and stakeholders expressed the opinion that whoever fills this position should be from one of the ethnic groups represented in the district. The opinion of the MTE differs, however. There is significant competition between the various ethnic groups that reside in Bandarban District and favoritism is very common among government stakeholders, i.e., seeking to place members of tribe or family in positions of power. A senior project position in SAPLING held by a member of one of the ethnic groups will likely feel significant pressure for support from his/her ethnic group and at least some significant obstacles imposed by powerful members of competing ethnic groups. As for having a Bengali in the senior position, there is significant tension now between Bengalis and the ethnic groups in the district based on historical factors and the influx over the last two decades of Bengali plain landers into the CHT.

RECOMMENDATION #11 DISTRICT COORDINATOR FILL A LONG-TERM POSITION FOR DISTRICT COORDINATOR

Ideally, this should be someone with good program skills, good management skills, and strong representation skills. It would be best filled by someone who is “neutral”, i.e., not likely to be pressured by any of the different ethnic groups that exist in the CHT. Ideally with experience in a similar setting, this person will be better positioned to monitor and mediate intra-project tensions and competition.

District Coordinator If the Two-Year Extension is Not Approved… This leadership gap at the District level is affecting the ability of the project to accelerate implementation. The recommendation proposes filling the position with someone who is neutral. With less than two years remaining in the life of the project if the two-year extension is not approved, however, the position should be filled by the best candidate possible, as quickly as possible. There won’t be time enough to go through more than one recruitment process.

1. Recommendation #12: Upazila Reorganization. As previously described under project management, the current upazila level organization of the project does not facilitate effective planning, budgeting and coordinated implementation. The role of implementing partners differs across the project, and in three upazilas, implementing partners have marginal roles for planning and budgeting. Technical support is siloed, and with significant differences in salary scales, tensions between partners are evident at the upazila level. While planning has improved with the introduction of the DAP, the budgeting around this plan is disjointed, with different partners responsible for different parts of the budget. Front-line workers are not receiving enough technical support from either Union Supervisors, because of their heavy workload, or from TOs, because they report to supervisors at the District-level and are heavily engaged in finance activities. The Upazila Coordinator in Lama Upazila has an extremely heavy workload because of the scale of the project in this upazila relative to other upazilas. Union Supervisors, in all case, have an extremely heavy workload with managing an implementation plan that covers all three purposes and supervisory responsibilities for large numbers of front-line staff. FFs who are responsible for multiple paras, often speaking different languages, have multiple groups to work with and multiple messages to deliver and may have to spend time on individual house visits when participants cannot attend group meetings. Field Implementation Coordinators provide good administrative support, but the

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 position only exists in three of the five upazilas. A significant reorganization can be undertaken in the next six months to a year to improve project planning, budgeting and delivery at the upazila level.

RECOMMENDATION #12 UPAZILA REORGANIZATION REVISE THE DELIVERY AND TECHNICAL SUPPORT STRUCTURE AT THE UPAZILA LEVEL

The Upazila should be made the major cost center for the project with coordinated planning and budgeting being undertaken at this level. Coordination is the key, and the key organization to be undertaking this coordinated planning and budgeting is the implementing partner. So, in each Upazila, one IP, GRAUS, Toymu or Tahzingdong, should be made responsible for line management from Upazila Coordinator through front-line staff. In Lama Upazila, two structures may need to be created corresponding to the two partners, Toymu and Tahzingdong, that are operating there. This will address the issue of workload for the current Upazila Coordinator in Lama. In order to address the issue of tension between technical partners in an upazila as well the issue of coordinating technical support at the upazila level, the technical delivery should be revised in each upazila, so that one of the consortium partners provides all technical support in the upazila. That means that HKI would be responsible for technical support in Rowangchari/Thanchi and Caritas would be responsible for technical support in Ruma/Bandarban Sadar/Lama. In each of the five upazilas, a Technical Support Manager position will be created to supervise these staff and this position. This position, while held by HKI or Caritas depending on the upazila will report to the Upazila Coordinator. In the reorganization, an Upazila Operations Manager position should be established in each upazila to oversee administrative support. This position would report to the Upazila Upazila Reorganization If the Two-Year Extension is Coordinator and would replace the Not Approved… current FIC positions in Ruma, Bandarban If the two-year extension is not approved, there will not be Sadar, and Lama. sufficient time to fully implement this recommendation. Parts Just as done in Lama with big unions, the of the recommendation, however, are still critical for enabling upazila reorganization should create more effective and efficient implementation of the project. As recommended, the upazila should be made the major cost cent more Union Supervisor positions where for the project and implementing partners should be made necessary (and possible within funding responsible for coordinating planning and budgeting in the constraints) to bring the ratio of upazila. Just as GRAUS manages implementation in supervisor to direct report at this level Rowangchari and Thanchi. Toymu and Tahzingdong should be down to a more manageable level. This made responsible for managing implementation in the other will enable the Union Supervisor to have three upazilas. There will not be time, however, for more time to provide support to front- implementing the part of the recommendation that shifts line staff. technical capacities between HKI and Caritas. For the remaining current life of SAPLING, these technical structures Finally, where needed, the catchment should remain as they are. The Upazila Operations Manager area of FFs should be reduced to a more position that has been recommended should be put in place, manageable level by hiring additional field especially to support expanded capacities for accounting and facilitators. In this process, the project procurement associated with implementing priority should match language skills of field Recommendation #14. facilitators as closely as possible with the language spoken in the assigned paras.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

Annex D contains a schematic illustrating the new upazila structure envisioned by this recommendation. The new structure will place significant demands on the capacities of the three IPs, so HKI and Caritas, should take responsibility for proactively coaching, mentoring and building their capacities, as part of the local capacity building theme in the project. D. THEME D: Planning and Budgeting SAPLING has been able to put in place a planning tool called a DAP which takes the activities described in the Detailed Implementation Plan for the life of the project and disaggregates the targets for these down to the union level. The tool tracks accrued monthly achievements against the targets which enables decision-makers to see and address emerging gaps. The DAP also provides the basis for annual budgeting. Some changes are needed to the DAP format to make it more complete, and budget allocation revisions are needed to be able to facilitate efficient planning of budgets against planned activities. 1. Recommendation #13: DAP Effectiveness. As previously described, the DAP with targets and achievements disaggregated to the union is a good implementation planning and monitoring tool. The MTE team heard many complaints, however, that implementation of the DAP is disrupted by unplanned activities imposed from above. Some of these are inevitable, e.g., the donor wants to know something34 about the project or needs support for organization donor visits or meetings. Some of the “new” tasks are coming from the M&E unit, but in fact, these are not really new, unplanned tasks. The M&E unit has its own DAP, but responsibilities for implementing M&E activities by Union Supervisors, for example, do not appear in the Union-level DAP. Thus, when Union Supervisors are asked to do something on M&E that is actually planned, it looks like new activities being imposed outside the DAP. As reported previously, there are disjointed monthly coordination meetings at the union level with different front-line staff meeting separately at different times. To facilitate better cross-purpose integration and coordination where field facilitators and CHSWs, for example, need to work together to deliver or reinforce messages, a single coordination meeting would be more efficient at the union level. At the moment, this is difficult to do simply with the number of front-line workers that are working under a Union Supervisor. This can be addressed, however, if the upazila reorganization recommendation to have more Union Supervisors is implemented.

RECOMMENDATION #13 DAP EFFECTIVENESS INCREASE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF THE DAP PLANNING AND MONITORING TOOL BY MAKING IT MORE COMPLETE AND MINIMIZING THE IMPOSITION OF ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES AFTER THE DAP HAS BEEN DEVELOPED.

As the project moves forward with implementing the DAP tool, the project should make the DAP tool as complete as possible. This means including not only P1, P2 and P3 activities, but also activities associated with the cross-cutting themes (gender, environmental monitoring, youth targeting and local capacity building) and M&E. To address the issue of new activities imposed on the DAP, field implementation managers should minimize the imposition of new activities outside of the DAP by (1) assessing the real need for the task, (2) considering alternatives, such as outsourcing, to meet the need,

34 There is a perception by the MTE team that this is heavier than usual for SAPLING. The SAPLING CoP is very responsive to requests from the donor, regardless of how disruptive these requests might be to project plans. The donor may want to also consider the parts of this recommendation that address the imposition of tasks on the project.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019 and (3) giving priority in principle to avoiding disruptions of planned work, i.e., just say no. To facilitate cross-purpose integration, managers should identify those activities in the DAP that require support from other components of the project and specify the types of support required.

DAP Effectiveness If the Two-Year Extension is Not Approved… This recommendation should be implemented as much as possible, regardless whether the two-year extension is approved.

2. Recommendation #14: Upazila Planning & Budgeting. In the current budgeting process, IPs budget their staff at the upazila and union levels, Caritas budgets their technical staff, and HKI budgets everything else, including operations costs. This explains why HKI TOs who are the only HKI staff at the upazila level are so engaged in financial activities. In recommendation #12, the MTE is recommending that the upazila become the primary planning and budgeting cost center. Under this recommendation, a consolidated Upazila DAP would be developed, and this would provide the basis for developing an upazila budget that matches closely the activities that have been planned. As previously reported, because the bottom-line budgets for implementing partners are fixed and the only significant expense for IPs is staff costs, IP staff are generally receiving lower salaries in SAPLING then they would, working in the same position in other projects within their organization. IPs should be able to budget staff costs according to the salary scales that they use across the organization. The MTE heard that planned activities in SAPLING are occasionally postponed because funds are not available to implement the activities. This should not be happening in a project that is entering its fourth year of implementation. Systems, including procurement planning and cash flow management, should be well enough established that project implementation proceeds smoothly.

RECOMMENDATION #16 UPAZILA PLANNING AND BUDGETING REVISE BUDGET ALLOCATIONS AND UPAZILA-LEVEL PLANNING AND BUDGETING PROCESSES

In implementing this recommendation, budgets for IPs should be increased to include operations and implementation costs in their respective upazilas, as well as sufficient funding to raise staff salaries at the front-lines to a conform with their own salary scales. The budget for technical support staff and associated costs, including per diem, travel and lodging, should still be managed by the technical partners, i.e., HKI for Rowangchari and Thanchi and Caritas for Ruma, Bandarban Sadar and Lama. The capacities for financial management at the upazila level should be increased so that TOs no longer need to undertake financial tasks that would normally be the responsibility of financial or administrative support staff. In some upazilas, this could mean establishing an additional accountant or procurement position under the new Operations Manager position. Also in support of this, the Upazila Planning and Budgeting If the Two-Year procurement approval function should be Extension is Not Approved… moved to the district level for at least This recommendation should be implemented as much as some procurement after the District possible, regardless whether the two-year extension is Coordinator position has been filled, to approved. shorten the procurement process.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report 17 April 2019

V. HIGHER LEVEL OBSERVATION – PROJECT SCOPE The MTE identified one observation that goes beyond the capacity of the SAPLING Project to address but may be of interest to SAPLING stakeholders or FFP. HKI has an excellent reputation in Bangladesh for nutritional surveillance and homestead food production that supports maternal and child health and nutrition and women’s empowerment. The organization made an ambitious decision to pursue the role of consortium lead for a multi-sectoral project in the CHT, an extremely difficult and unique context in Bangladesh. The call for proposals stipulated that a wide range of impact groups should be targeted with a multi-sectoral strategy that addressed food security, nutrition and resilience. In order to be competitive, HKI felt that they had to submit a proposal that included all of the impact groups and the full range of goal elements. One has to wonder, however, if it would not have been a better investment for HKI to focus on its strengths in nutrition and women’s empowerment with a project that focused specifically on, for example, prevention of child malnutrition. At the time the project was designed, however, this was not considered an option, since the risk was too great that a project proposal that did not cover all of the perceived key elements in the RFA would not be approved. FFP may want to consider whether, at least in some cases, greater returns on the investment of FFP resources might be gained from projects that are not trying to do everything (food security, nutrition and resilience) with everybody (all food insecure and vulnerable people). VI. CONCLUDING REMARKS The MTE found that the SAPLING Project has made good progress in getting fully underway in the last year. There would be substantial concern if the project had only two years remaining in its life, and the priority recommendations would have focused more on scaling back on the range of activities and reducing targets. With the two-year extension extending the project life to four years from now, however, there is time to complete the approaches that have been planned, if at least half of the extension period can be used for completing implementation. In the coming period, the project should focus on contextualizing the SAPLING strategy, thinking more rigorously about sustainable impact, refining implementation approaches to align with current best practice, and restructuring project delivery to increase planning and monitoring effectiveness.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex A

SAPLING Mid-Term Evaluation PRIORITY RECOMMENDATIONS

STRATEGIC THINKING (3) RECOMMENDATION #1 (Strategy for Remote Highlands): Adapt the SAPLING Strategy to be more appropriate for the remote highland areas. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: Since SAPLING is already planning to undertake a review of its ToC, this opportunity should be used to adapt parts of the project strategy to make it more appropriate for the remote highland areas, particularly under Purpose 1 to focus more on jhum cultivation and under Purpose 2 to contextualize the messages to address the unique barriers to behavioral change that have been identified by the qualitative research. RECOMMENDATION #2 (Expand the Focus on Income Generation): Revise and expand the project strategy for promoting IGAs, particularly for non-farm opportunities. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: If a two-year extension is not approved, there will be limited time to undertake any sort of processes, like a value chain analysis, to identify new IGA opportunities, particularly for non-farm opportunities. In the remaining life, the project should focus on building on the experience the project has already acquired with aquaculture, poultry, and the agricultural sub-sectors identified, but accelerate implementation of marketing interventions (Priority Recommendation #4) and use conditional cash transfers (Priority Recommendation #5) rather than distributing seed. RECOMMENDATION #3: (Thinking Sustainably): Expand capacities in the project at all levels for thinking sustainably. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: This recommendation is critical to ensuring that the project achieves sustainable impact and should be fully implemented in the remaining life of the project. IMPLEMENTATION QUALITY (7) RECOMMENDATION #4 (Expand the Focus on Marketing): Accelerate implementation of marketing strategies. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: It is rather late in the project life to be forming new groups such as marketing committees, that will be fully functional and self-sustaining in the less than two years remaining in the life of the project. In its remaining life, the project should not attempt to establish marketing committees but should focus on building the capacities of learning center leaders to be market brokers (like farias) and linking them to the existing marketing systems, i.e., paikers, just as HKI has done in previous Title II projects. RECOMMENDATION #5 (Conditional Cash Transfers): Shift to a conditional cash transfer model for input support to both IEHFP and IGA groups. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: This recommendation has potential for enabling participants to undertake productive activities that capitalize on their individual interests and comparative advantage. It is not possible in the remaining life of SAPLING to undertake a complete capacity-building process for building participant capacities for good selection, planning and management of IGAs. The project should, however, develop a process for building basic IGA planning capacities and proceed with implementing a conditional cash transfer process in which the condition for receiving a cash grant is development of an individual IGA business plan. RECOMMENDATION #6 (Focusing Under Purpose 1): Review the curriculum for Purpose 1 to deliver fewer, more streamlined and effective sessions.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex A

SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: It is important that the project take the opportunity now to implement as much of this recommendation as possible with the focus to deliver fewer, more streamlined and effective sessions, especially given the short time remaining in the project life if the two- year extension is not approved. RECOMMENDATION #7 (CHSW Capacities): Enhance the performance of Community Health Service Workers. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: Some elements of this recommendation can be implemented in the remaining life of the project. The salary issue for CHSWs should certainly be addressed. There will also be time for one good refresher training for all CHSWs targeting job approach (listening to and counseling participants), some technical areas including GMP, and capacities for CHSWs to identify pregnancies. Supervisors should also be re-oriented to providing ongoing supportive supervision of CHSWs focused on problem-solving. The part of the recommendation to build the capacities of CHSWs to become fully functional Community-Based Skilled Birth Attendant (CSBAs) should not be implemented since the focus needs to be on deliver of the core messages in the remaining life of the project. RECOMMENDATION #8 (Potable Water Supply): In the 100 paras that are targeted for WASH (i.e., no expansion), focus on strengthening existing DPHE capacity and developing community-based capacities for repair and maintenance of potable water hardware. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: As indicated in the report, the WASH strategy is on track and this recommendation is more to sharpen and strengthen its implementation. With less than two years remaining in the project life if the two-year extension is not approved, the focus should be on ensuring effective implementation of the project’s WASH strategy, including developing community capacities for repair and maintenance of potable water sources. The part of the recommendation on strengthening the DPHE capacities which would require substantial effort and time on the part of the project staff should not be implemented. RECOMMENDATION #9 (Nurturing Connections): Review and revise the implementation of the Nurturing Connections intervention. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: This approach is critical to SAPLING’s gender transformation objective, and the recommendation should be fully implemented in the remaining life of the project. RECOMMENDATION #10 (Risk Reduction Action Plans): Provide guidance and capacity-building support to UDMCs for mobilizing resources from the GoB, private sector and NGOs to implement activities in the RRAP. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: If the two-year extension is not approved, SAPLING should focus in its remaining life on making the most effective use of cash-for-work resources to support RRAP implementation and work toward integrating RRAPs into the GoB planning and budgeting processes. There is not enough time to also build capacities of UDMCs to mobilize resources from other non-GoB sources, such as the private sector or NGOs. ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE (2) RECOMMENDATION #11 (District Coordinator): Fill a long-term position for District Coordinator. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: This leadership gap at the District level is affecting the ability of the project to accelerate implementation. The recommendation proposes filling the position with someone who is neutral. With less than two years remaining in the life of the project if the two-year

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex A extension is not approved, however, the position should be filled by the best candidate possible, as quickly as possible. There won’t be time enough to go through more than one recruitment process. RECOMMENDATION #12 (Upazila Reorganization): Revise the delivery and technical support structure at the Upazila level. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: If the two-year extension is not approved, there will not be sufficient time to fully implement this recommendation. Parts of the recommendation, however, are still critical for enabling more effective and efficient implementation of the project. As recommended, the upazila should be made the major cost cent for the project and implementing partners should be made responsible for coordinating planning and budgeting in the upazila. Just as GRAUS manages implementation in Rowangchari and Thanchi. Toymu and Tahzingdong should be made responsible for managing implementation in the other three Upazilas. There will not be time, however, for implementing the part of the recommendation that shifts technical capacities between HKI and Caritas. For the remaining current life of SAPLING, these technical structures should remain as they are. The Upazila Operations Manager position that has been recommended should be put in place, especially to support expanded capacities for accounting and procurement associated with implementing priority Recommendation #14. PLANNING AND BUDGETING (2) RECOMMENDATION #13 (DAP Effectiveness): Increase the effectiveness of the DAP planning and monitoring tool by making it more complete and minimizing the imposition of additional activities after the DAP has been developed. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: This recommendation should be implemented as much as possible, regardless whether the two-year extension is approved. RECOMMENDATION #14 (Upazila Budgeting): Revise budget allocations and upazila- level planning and budgeting processes. SUGGESTION FOR REMAINING LOA: This recommendation should be implemented as much as possible, regardless whether the two-year extension is approved.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B

SAPLING Mid-Term Evaluation ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATIONS

Following are observations and additional recommendations generated by the MTE that did not make the short-list of prioritized recommendations. These are still useful, however, for improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the program. ======CONTEXT Observations. The MTE observed an extremely high level of expectations for tangible handouts from participants and even government stakeholders in the CHT. During recovery in post-conflict contexts, NGOs and other agencies often address needs through direct distribution of seed, tools, food and non- food items. The UNDP Project that operated in Bandarban District provided asset transfers that reinforced the impression that development is about getting things from development organizations. SAPLING may be amplifying the problem by also giving people seed and chickens without sufficiently clear conditions. The benefits being generated by the messages from the training provided by SAPLING are not yet being realized, so the main benefit participants are seeing are the tangible seed and chickens. The basic problem is motivation for participants to continue participating until they see benefit. RECOMMENDATION #B-1 (Expectations Syndrome): Reduce the effect of SAPLING on the expectations syndrome by not distributing tangible items unconditionally, working on systems that will ensure the sustainability of tangible items that have been provided, and being clearer with communications from the onset on why assets or transfer are being or will be provided and why some participants receive these and others do not. ------Observations. Despite the Peace Agreement in 1997, the CHT still shows indications of being a post- conflict context. There are significant tensions between Bengalis, who have come into the CHT from the plain lands and ethnic groups. There is also competition between ethnic groups for power. Foreigners require special permission from the Ministry of Home Affairs to enter the CHT, and there is a heavy army presence throughout the region. The SAPLING project is still not allowed to enter some paras and is occasionally asked to suspend field work in others. Compared to other parts of Bangladesh, there are more personal security risks for staff working in the CHT from kidnappings by insurgents, cross-border incursions from Myanmar, road and boat accidents, landslides and wild animal attacks. RECOMMENDATION #B-2 (Capacities to Work in a Post-Conflict Setting): Build capacities and provide support to staff consistent with best practices for working in a post-conflict context, including providing training on conflict mediation, raising awareness on how to appreciate and work with people from other cultures, and developing contingency plans for ensuring the personal security of staff ======PURPOSE 1 – INCOME AND ACCESS TO FOOD Observations. Under Purpose I, SAPLING promotes linkages to several government entities, including the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE), Department of Livestock Services (DLS), and the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute (BARI). As part of SAPLING’s strategy, for example, livestock health workers (LHWs) are trained to provide vaccinations, the vaccines for which are purchased from the Upazila Livestock Office. However, LHWs are not SAPLING staff, i.e., they receive no salary or benefits from SAPLING but are instead remunerated for their vaccination services from individuals within the communities they serve. Thus, there is no direct link between SAPLING Project activities and the Livestock Office in upazilas where LHWs operate.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B

Links between SAPLING and other government line offices are perhaps more direct in terms of staff of each attending trainings provided by the other. Nonetheless, it was obvious from interviews during the MTE with government officers that they had superficial understanding of SAPLING as a project and little if any hands-on experience or interaction with its staff or activities. At the same time, the DAE for example, is also promoting new agricultural technologies and practices, irrigation systems, and alternatives to jhum cultivation. Recommendation #B-3 (GoB Partnerships): Strengthen partnerships with government where possible, especially under Purpose 1 (e.g., DAE, Horticulture Institute, DLS, BARI). As part of SAPLING’s longer-term sustainability strategy, strong partnerships should be developed not only with local NGOs but with local government offices as well. Opportunities for including government staff (e.g., SAAOs) in SAPLING technical trainings and field visits should be promoted when possible. Likewise, SAPLING should take better advantage of training opportunities and services offered by government entities (e.g., the Horticulture Institute, Department of Fisheries), where feasible. Stronger links would reduce redundancy of effort (e.g., in-kind seed distribution) and the likelihood of competing – and contrary – messages (e.g., promotion of organic versus inorganic fertilizers). ======PURPOSE 2 – MATERNAL AND CHILD HEALTH AND NUTRITION Observations. Many of the CHSWs have received the MOHFW approved Community Based Skilled Birth Attendants (CSBA) training from the earlier UNDP project, and they are doing deliveries within the community and get paid in cash or kind (whatever is affordable) by the community. They have also been trained to recognize complications and understand when to refer the PWs for higher level care. Therefore, they fill a service delivery gap, and there needs to be an organized process to ensure that they can provide the service. SAPLING could ensure that process without being responsible for actual service delivery. RECOMMENDATION #B-4 (CHSWs as SBAs): SAPLING should make list of all CHSWs who have received CSBA training and negotiate with the MOHFW or NGOs (e.g., the Smiling Sun franchise) to provide refresher training to them, thus helping them to upgrade their skills. The project should also think about setting up a referral process, whereby these trained CSBAs develop a relationship with the CHCP, FWV or NGO service providers for the referral of complicated cases. SAPLING would thus have facilitated the provision of services in the community without being directly involved in delivery of services. ------Observations. Bandarban lacks available and accessible health care services. The MOHFW resources is stretched and not adequate to meet the health care needs of the district. SAPLING is a key player in this sector in the district and thus it is imperative that it maintains a strong collaboration with the MOHFW. In his meeting with the MTE team the Civil Surgeon expressed the need for the project’s support for referral care of pregnant women; malnourished child or sick adult in the following ways RECOMMENDATION #B-5 (Collaboration with MOHFW): The following actions are recommended to ensure such a collaboration: • Assist the MoHFW to track PWs who have not completed the required four ANC visits, received PNC visits, and refer to the MoHFW for birth registration and certification as the birth certificate is essential for major interventions such as school admission, access to immunizations and other services. • As a task shifting effort, agree with the MoHFW on the basic ANC and PNC that the CHSW can provide in places where there is no community clinic or Family Welfare Volunteer. Several NGOs in Bangladesh have successfully ensured such services through their community-based health workers who have the same educational qualification as the SAPLING CHSW.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B

• Mobile health care services to be made available by the MOHFW at regular intervals to paras which do not have access to functioning health care facilities, to provide immediate and follow up care. • Identify fully functional Community Clinics, Family Welfare Centers, Maternal and Child Welfare Centers or NGO facilities at a reasonable distance from the para and have agreement with the MoHFW or the NGO that they would accept referrals made by SAPLING staff. • Create Social Emergency Fund through the CDRT, to cover transportation and treatment cost of emergency referrals. ------Observations. After the initial MNCH group sessions, the number of PLWs are decreasing and it’s important to motivate PLWs to have a continued interest in the MNCH sessions. One reason for this decrease has been the loss of the day’s wage when they attend the sessions. RECOMMENDATION #B-6 (Motivating PLW): The following actions as recommended based on experience in other countries. • The sessions are also opportunities to ensure the women take their required care and follow up services. For a Lactating Women this is not critical and the focus should be on individual counselling during HH visits or GMP/EPI sessions. • Compensate their lost earning due to the time given to attend session; their opportunity cost. • Cash Transfer Programs • Link up with the Gob’s Social Safety Net program (implemented through the Union Parishad) to provide monthly stipend of TK 800 for three years to very poor PLWs (from 2nd trimester of pregnancy to completion of the child’s 3rd year) • Conditional Cash Transfers (CCT) for PLWs -providing cash payments to families in exchange for uptake of activities critical to improving their health and nutrition - attend key MNCH sessions, 4 ANCs and at least 2 PNCs; monthly GMP; Complete immunization through 2 years of the infants age. This would be a one-time payment after the child has reached her/his 2nd year and would be paid in lieu of a voucher. This has been successfully implemented in many countries, however in all cases funds for the cash transfers were committed and availability ensured up front. ------Observations. The Adolescent girls in the hill areas groups brought up the non-availability of sanitary napkins as an issue that should be addressed. This is because the market was very far from their para and access was also difficult. In addition, the adolescent girls said that they wanted to learn to make various handicrafts which they would like to sell. RECOMMENDATION #B-7 (Strengthen Adolescent Group Sessions and form Adolescent SILC Groups): Organize Adolescent girls to form SILC groups so they will have savings. In addition, provide them with selection planning and management training to be able analyze IGA opportunities, including the production and sale of sanitary napkins and various types of handicrafts. The initial capital for these activities will come from their savings. Thus, having activities which address their needs - this will result in more interest among the girls to continue as a group. The group sessions could be used to reinforce with the girls (1) their nutrition and growth as their body changes in puberty and beyond, and (2) function as agents of change in their household and communities on use of latrine and hand washing. ======PURPOSE 3 -MITIGATING, ADAPTING TO AND RECOVERING FROM SHOCKS Observations. Until last year all 31 DMCs (24 UDMCs, 5 UzDMCs and 2 PDMCs) were not fully functional as they were neither holding regular monthly meetings nor fulfilling required meeting quorum. Continued project support enables DMCs operational; committee meetings are scheduled regularly with

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B the participation of two-thirds of the members. Each of the DMCs is comprised of 36-40 members. Over 90% of these committees have received training on DRM by September 2018. UDMCs formed, according to the revised (draft) Standing Order on Disaster (SOD), incorporating the Headmen and Karbaris in the UDMCs of the unions vulnerable to landslide. SAPLING facilitates the DMC meetings, coordinates meeting agenda and provides transport allowances to the UDMC members for attending committee meetings. This is a matter of concern about sustainability of UDMCs. UzDMCs are responsible for supporting UDMCs to increase their efficiency in disseminating early warning, developing risk reduction programs, awareness raising, and emergency response. Another important platform at the upazila level that reviews union’s DRR related agenda and takes decisions on project approval for funding is the Upazila Development Coordination Committee (UzDCC). SAPLING participates in the monthly meetings of the UDCC. Project needs to see whether or not the DMCs are functional without project support after few more rounds of facilitation. RECOMMENDATION #B-8 (Upazila Support for UDMCs): SAPLING should gradually withdraw its financial support but maintain its advocacy for increased UzDMC budget allocation to UDMC schemes, for example, those proposed in the RRAP of the union, selection of households proposed for inclusion in the GoB safety net. ------Observations. As part institutional strengthening SAPLING under its P3 has established groups of volunteers of adolescent and youth girls and boys to lead community level disaster preparedness, search and rescue (S&R), promote community awareness on natural resource management (NRM) and implement mitigation measures at the rural and urban communities. SAPLING distributed personal protective equipment (PPE), rescue equipment and first aid box to most of the groups of volunteers. The groups of volunteers include: ➢ CDRTs (99 teams), RCYV (5 groups, 1 at the district and 4 upazila groups) and school-based Pre RCYV (15 groups) formed in collaboration with the BDRCS. These volunteers received training on first aid and search and rescue. ➢ Urban community volunteers (90) enrolled with FSCD in the Bandarban Sadar and Lama pouroshavas to join the S&R operation lead by the FSCD first responder teams ➢ School-based FMBs formed and sensitized in 15 schools on the adverse impact of stone collection, deforestation and hill slope cutting as well as on the importance of mitigation measures such as tree plantation and sapling nurseries. As the volunteer groups are concerned with the sustainability of their services, they would want to see stronger linkages to the DMCs at the unions and upazila levels. This can be done through creating a database and networking of different groups of volunteers. RECOMMENDATION #B-9 (Linkages for UDMCs): Establish a fully functional database and network of CDRT, RCYV, UCV and FMB groups of volunteers and link the network of volunteers to the DMCs at unions and upazilas. Identify the member-secretary of the DDMC as the focal point at the district and the member-secretary of the UzDMC as focal point at the upazila. ------Observations. SAPLING, under its DRM purpose (P3), has established a wide network of volunteers to build the DRM capacities of the local elected bodies, nation building departments through integration of training, simulation and equipment. Pool of youths and adolescents have been selected and some groups have received training in first aid, search and rescue with the provision of personal protective equipment (PPE), rescue equipment and first aid box while most of the groups received orientation on NRM. These packaging of interventions that are much needed for DRM have potential for replication. Training those included simulation exercises are found effective. Training course topics and lessons as being important but they need to be updated and practiced on a regular basis, maybe twice in a year. Realizing the importance of the trainings and simulations offered by SAPLING, the volunteer groups

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B have expressed their interest for additional refreshers and simulation exercises to be conducted at least annually. The youth and adolescent volunteers are found enthusiastic, interested to learn and most importantly willing to continue after project ends. RECOMMENDATION #B-10 (Refreshers and Simulations): Organize Search and Rescue, and Fire Fighting refreshers and simulations for the volunteers at least once in a year. ------Observations. Community volunteers are invariably a valuable resource and network in emergency preparedness and response. The pool of trained RCYV, UCV and FMBs are recognized for their service in the community. But institutionalization of the volunteers is a key to the sustainability of this humanitarian force besides building network of volunteer groups, and linking them to the local elected bodies and nation building departments. It is also important highlighting the works of the volunteers at the participating institutions, implementing partners, nodal agencies and relevant stakeholders. RECOMMENDATION #B-11 (Recognition for Volunteers): Advocacy at the national level forum or committee such as at the Project Steering Committee Meeting for government recognition of volunteers for their contribution in humanitarian assistance service to inspire them to stay in volunteerism. The skill and experience of the volunteers shall be a value addition to their qualification and shall receive a positive rating when they apply for jobs in the public or private sectors. ------Observations. Households interviewed during the MTE reported learning lessons and their confidence in the disaster preparedness actions such as source of early warning messages, store dried food, rescue children, elderly, pregnant and lactating members in the family first. Households (2,301 out of 5,113 LOA total) in 5 most vulnerable unions have prepared their Household DRR Action Plans upon completion of six additional sessions on topics related to disaster risks, social services and preventive measures. The sessions do not include any lessons specifically on idiosyncratic (illness, unemployment, food crisis, water crisis) and covariate (catastrophic weather events, pest attacks, animal attacks) shocks and stresses. Households could hardly to remember all the topics covered in the sessions. Nevertheless, the positive feedback on the relevance of the SAPLING-conducted household disaster preparedness and mitigation sessions conducted for the households in the 5 most vulnerable unions have good prospect for adoption and replication in the remaining 6 most vulnerable unions. The government officials at the district and upazilas, the local elected bodies at the unions and the traditional leaders at the communities advocated for inclusion of these unions in the next implementation cycle of SAPLING. The in-depth training sessions seem to have worked well. The adoption and replication of these sessions can be done in the remaining unions of SAPLING. But care should be given to the feedback of the households and communities to revisit the sessions so that the participants can easily grasp the technical contents of the sessions. They need the sessions that can be easily understood at their levels. RECOMMENDATION #B-12 (Household Follow-Up): Need periodic follow up visits by frontline staff, CDRT and UDMC members for at least once in a year to the households to refresh them the training topics learned in DRM sessions. The in-depth sessions conducted in the 5 most vulnerable unions shall be replicated in the remaining 6 most vulnerable unions by incorporating the feedback of the households and communities about their instincts and abilities to understand and adapt the contents of the sessions. These activities shall be implemented by FY 2019 allowing sufficient time within the remaining life of the project to see the impact of the training. ------Observations. Occasionally, household-level emergencies occur that are beyond the scope of a household, for example, a medical emergency in a para that requires travel costs to get to health services, a house fire, and so on. Interviewees of SAPLING households, community leaders and union parishad representatives have proposed for project support for rapid emergency response in the most

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B food insecure communities that experience frequent hazards and shocks. These emergencies are not large enough to merit an official emergency response, but the household needs emergency support. The social fund in a SILC can be used to cover some of these costs, but the costs may far exceed the amount available from the fund depending on SILC group policies. A viable option is maintaining a small amount of cash reserves and identification of a feasible fund management for emergency preparations in advance of disasters or response following a disaster. PLW need emergency assistance to a greater extent. RECOMMENDATION #B-13 (Household Resilience Support Fund): In order to be able to cover household level emergencies that go beyond the capacity of a SILC Social Fund, create a small household emergency fund under the management of the UDMC. ▪ Build capacities of the UDMC to manage the fund ▪ Build capacities of the UDMC to replenish the fund through local contributions ▪ Provide initial capitalization of the fund ======CROSS-CUTTING THEMES Observations. Across all of its project purposes SAPLING supports diversified groups of adolescent and youth girls and boys to build their skills for improved livelihoods in collaboration with public and private organizations. The project recognizes that employment and economic engagement of the adolescents and youths are key to the future of Bangladesh. Overall, SAPLING is already engaging significantly numbers of youth, so it is not necessary for the project to develop a more rigorous strategy for targeting youth. Because youth targeting is a cross-cutting theme, however, the project needs to do a better job of monitoring the participation of youth in project activities and documenting their participation. RECOMMENDATION #B-14 (Youth Targeting): Monitor the levels of participation of youth in SAPLING project activities by delegating a point person in each upazila to be the focal person for youth targeting and facilitate access to information on youth participation in project activities from the project’s data base. When the final evaluation occurs, these point persons should be able to clearly articulate how youth are participating in SAPLING and the scale of their participation. ------Observations. Under the local Capacity Building Cross-Cutting Theme, SAPLING has made a commitment to building the capacities of GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong. Priority recommendations made by the MTE will significantly expand the responsibilities for these partners, and the project should give priority focus to building their capacities to be able to effectively implement their new responsibilities. RECOMMENDATION #B-15 (Capacity Building of GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong): Discontinue the general organizational development capacity building strategy that has been implemented up to this point with GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong, and shift the strategy (including resources) to building the capacities of the three partners to be able to plan, implement and monitor SAPLING activities effectively at the Upazila level given their expanded roles. ------Observations. The capacity building activity under the Local Capacity Building Cross-cutting Theme (see page 31) that targets building the capacities of six local NGOs is unlikely to show much impact if the current strategy is continued. The targeted NGOs for this activity are Kothowain, Green Land, Bandarban Disabled Peoples Organization for Development, Bolipara Narikalyan Somity, Ananya Kallyan Songathan, and Aathung Foundation, and they range from very small to very large. A “one size fits all approach” is ineffective with six local partners with fairly wide-ranging capacities and different capacity building needs. The project also does not have sufficient resources to undertake tailored organizational development capacity which would be much more likely to have measurable impact. The activity cannot be dropped, however, since it would have repercussions on the relationship with the Bandarban Hill

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B

District Council. The strategy for the capacity building needs to be revised, however, in order to be able show impact on the organizational capacities of the six selected NGOs. RECOMMENDATION #B-16 (Capacity Building of Local NGOs): Revise the strategy for building the capacities of six local NGOs to focus on identifying a specific, challenging niche for each within the SAPLING strategy and then building their capacities to effectively fill the niches. It’s not clear at this point which niches are appropriate for each of the six partners. The project should undertake a dialogue with each to find a suitable role that will fit within the budget that is available for providing grant support (Fixed Amount Award) and that represents a relative new area of endeavor for the NGO. The niche might be related to a specific type of research that can be undertaken to support SAPLING. It could also be related to developing capacities to provide a sustainable service, e.g., farm input supply or SILC technical support. BRAC and other NGOs, for example, have been engaged in private sector activities for decades, and around the world there are technical support organizations that have spun off projects like SAPLING to provide paid consulting services to development projects on VSLA or SILC. Once the niche has been identified, implementation plans should be developed to both implement the activity and undertake the necessary capacity building to be able to effectively implement the plans. ======TARGETING, IMPACT & TOC Observations. HKI and USAID/FFP are in discussions around extending the SAPLING Project with limited cost for an additional two years. These discussions, incidentally, are being held with all three DFSAs currently being implemented in Bangladesh. SAPLING, however, is at a very different stage in its implementation, given the obstacles that needed to be addressed through various transitions in implementing strategy in 2016, 2017 and 2018. It is only since April 2018, that agreement was finally reached with the CHTRC to assign Lama and Thanchi Upazilas to Toymu/Tahzingdong and GRAUS, respectively. RECOMMENDATION #B-17 (Two-Year Extension Strategy): In the two-year cost extension that will be proposed shortly, SAPLING should propose one year of continued implementation followed by one year of disengagement and monitoring of outcomes generated by the project, providing remedial support where necessary to ensure sustained impact. ======IMPLEMENTATION SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT Observations. If the recommendations on reorganizing the project structure, planning and budgeting at the Upazila level are implemented, there will be renewed need for the senior leadership among SAPLINGs partnerships to be fully engaged and monitoring progress. At the moment, there are ad hoc meetings between the SAPLING management team, the senior leadership of CRS and Caritas, and the executive directors of GRAUS, Toymu and Tahzingdong. At least over the next year during the transition, there is a need for more regular meetings at this level. RECOMMENDATION #B-18 (Stakeholder Meetings): Regularize quarterly meetings in Dhaka or Chittagong with senior representatives from project stakeholders to discuss and address issues and opportunities. ------Observations. As mentioned, with the fully functional M&E unit, there is a tendency for decision- makers to rely to heavily on M&E staff. Once STREAM becomes fully operational, managers at different levels should be able to access STREAM themselves to pull off information for their own planning and monitoring purposes rather than depending on M&E staff to do this for them.

SAPLING MTE Summary Report Annex B

RECOMMENDATION #B-19 (Using M&E for Decision-Making): Implementation staff and managers should be trained on how to use M&E information for decision-making (adaptive management in the FFP terminology) and should be coached on how to access information from the project’s data bases (Household census and STREAM). ------Observations. Project staff should not have to be handling advances to be able to undertake project activities such as training events, learning and sharing meetings, and so on. On occasion, they may incur personal costs for handling large advances, e.g., bank transfer fees. Most of these staff are HKI technical officers and these finance tasks take time away from their normal responsibilities for providing technical support. A number of priority recommendations are intended to address this, including giving more responsibility to implementing partners for budget management at the Upazila level and expanding capacities for financial management by accounting staff at the Upazila level. Cash transfers in the future should go to project bank accounts at the Upazila level. RECOMMENDATION #B-20 (Upazila Bank Accounts): IPs should establish Upazila-level project bank accounts so that cash transfers can be made to this account rather than to individual staff member accounts. ------Observations. Proper planning of procurement can reduce problems associated with submission and processing of procurement requests. Once annual plans have been developed, it is fairly easy to see when procurement is expected to occur. RECOMMENDATION #B-21 (Monthly Procurement Plan): Institute a monthly procurement planning process to facilitate more rapid submission and approval of procurement. ------Observations. The MTE observed a notable lack of appreciation in the project for the front-lines. Volunteers in remote areas have to pay out of pocket expenses to do their work for travel and lodging. Staff have had to take salary cuts to join the project, e.g., to go from being a Caritas staff to becoming an IP staff. As mentioned, within the same IP comparing salaries at the same position but in different projects, SAPLING salaries are lower, although the complexity of the job is greater. The project doesn’t provide lunch when staff are traveling for a whole day to attend a project event like a learning and sharing meeting. If front-line workers are not happy and satisfied in their jobs, the project will suffer. RECOMMENDATION #B-22 (Attitudes Toward Front-Line Staff): Work on changing attitudes in the project toward front-line staff, so that project technical and administrative support is seen to be serving the front-lines. ======

SHOUHARDO III MTE Summary Report Annex C

SAPLING Mid-Term Evaluation Finance & Commodity Management Tables

The following tables provide additional quantitative information on finance and commodity management in the SAPLING Project

FINANCE

Table C-1. Cash Expenditure Summary though June 2018 (US$)

Monetization Cost Center 202e ITSH Total Proceeds HKI 6,259,145 2,092,474 56,386 8,408,007 Caritas 1,797,901 ------1,797,901 GRAUS 185,735 ------185,735 World Fish 53,115 ------53,115 CRS --- 732,982 --- 732,982 Total Direct Costs 8,295,896 2,825,456 56,386 11,177,738 NICRA for HKI 68,262 25,441 --- 93,703 NICRA for CRS --- 130,617 --- 130,617 Overhead for Caritas 7,340 ------7,340 Overhead for GRAUS 18,116 ------18,116 ICR for World Fish 8,498 ------8,498 Total Expenses 8,398,113 2,850,898 56,386 11,305,397 Total LoA Budget at Time 19,189,456 5,416,958 100,034 24,706,448 of Approval Current Projected Budget 16,850,041 8,345,125 100,000 25,295,166 Burn Rate 49.8% 34.2% 56.4% 44.7%

COMMODITIES

Table C-2. LoA Commodity Summary for Monetization (MT)

Proposed Approved Completed Fiscal Year Monetization Monetization Monetization FY 15 10,999 10,99935 11,000 FY 16 11,996 20,10036 20,100 FY 17 16,519 7,53037 7,530 FY 18 12,484 18,66038 18,660 FY 19 8,261 ------LoA Totals 60,260 57,290 57,290 Percentage of Approved Monetization 100% Achieved Through June 2018

35 Per Agreement – AID-FFP-A-15-00010 36 Per Modification No. 2 37 Per Modification No. 7 38 Per Modification No. 9

SHOUHARDO III MTE Summary Report Annex C

Table C-3. Commodity Loss Summary (MT)

Amount Amount Ocean Percent Fiscal Year Called Received in Losses Lost Forward Country FY 15 11,000 - 11,000.15 - FY 16 20,100 - 20,100.43 - FY 17 7,530 - 7,530.36 - FY 18 Thru Qtr 3 18,660 - 18,661.638 - TOTAL 57,290 - 57,292.578 0.0 %

Table C-4. Monetization Cost Recovery

SALE SALE FISCAL QUANTITY C&F COST COMMODITY PRICE No. YEAR (MT) ($/MT) RECOVERY ($/MT) 1 2015-2016 11,000 293.828 243.510 82.875% 2 2016-2017 Soft White Wheat, 20,100 342.360 283.731 82.875% 3 2017-2018 Bulk 7,530 366.603 303.823 82.875% 4 2018-2019 18,660 400.949 332.286 82.875% TOTAL FY 2015 thru FY 2018 QTR 3 57,290 355.311* 294.464* 82.875% *Weighted averages by volume **FY17 sales price is tentative

Table C-5. Distribution of Adolescent and Youth by Age Groups – Bandarban District

Percent of Total Total Male Female Age Group Adolescents Population in and Youth Bandarban N % N % 10 to 19 61,662 23% 31,420 51% 30,242 49% 19+ to 25 26,158 10% 12,589 48% 13,569 52% 25+ to 35 42,659 16% 20,336 48% 22,323 52% Total Age 10 to 35 130,479 52,715 66,134 Source: Household Census conducted by SAPLING between October 2016 and March 2018

SHOUHARDO III MTE Summary Report Annex D

PROPOSED UPAZILA STRUCTURE (PRIORITY RECOMMENDATION #12)

All HKI in IMPLEMENTING PARTNER Rowangchari & Thanchi GRAUS in Rowangchari & Thanchi All Caritas in Ruma, Upazila Bandarban Sadar & Coordinator Toymu in Ruma & Lama Lama Tahzingdong in Bandarban Sadar & Lama

Technical Support Manager Operations Manager

M&E Technical Support Technical – Horticulture, Support – Support Animal Husbandry, SILC, DRR Accountant Staff Marketing, MCHN & WASH & Gender Union Supervisor

WASH FF SILC CHSWs DRM FFs Agent CM