Forest Farm Facility and Myanmar Environment Rehabilitation-Conservation Network

FOREST & FARM FACILITY AND MYANMAR ENVIRONMENT REHABILITATION- CONSERVATION NETWORK

CALL FOR PROPOSALS

Forest & Farm Facility The Forest and Farm Facility (FFF) supports smallholder producer organizations to provide business incentives and a policy voice for sustainable forest landscape. FFF will assist Myanmar to: (a) organize producer groups for business development and policy engagement; (b) facilitate cross-sector dialogue on how to improve the enabling environment for producer group business at government level.

This Call for Proposals is being issued by FFF in cooperation with the Myanmar Environment Rehabilitation-conservation Network (MERN) and is intended to support the formation and strengthening of smallholder producer groups in forest landscapes. It is expected that additional calls for proposals will be issued in Myanmar based on the results of this one.

Financial contribution and duration Each project proposal can request up to USD15 000. FFF grants are provided directly to the beneficiary organisation in two installments. All activities should be completed within 6 months.

Expected activities may include the following examples:  Explain the economic benefits for forest farmers of working in groups.  Inventory forest and farm products of each producer that could be sold considering market demand.  Facilitate meetings with buyers to assess market demand for specific products.  Facilitate a decision making process for a producer group to select the product they want to harvest, process, pack, transport or sell together.  Hire a consultant or lawyer to advise on the legal options, and the advantages and disadvantages of each, for establishing a community managed business.  Facilitate decisions by the producer group on the business objectives, benefit sharing, and roles and responsibilities of members.  Legally register, or start the process for registering, a community managed business.  Facilitate a process through which the producer group can articulate solutions to policy barriers that they face.  Facilitate the producer group to prepare a long term-business plan and prioritized next steps.

Format, additional information and deadline Applicants are requested to contact Aung Thant Zin, MERN Fund Manager at [email protected] for the proposal template and any further information. Please also visit our website: www.fao.org/partnerships/forest-farm-facility. Proposals should be emailed to MERN. The deadline for submitting the proposals to MERN is 17 hrs, Yangon time, 19 June 2013.

Selection of proposals The proposals will be evaluated and ranked by a selection committee, and successful applicants will be notified by the end of June 2013. The selection committee will include representatives from FFF, MERN, Myanmar Government and business. Annex 1

ELIGIBILITY AND CRITERIA FOR GRANT SELECTION

Eligibility 1. Applicant must be located in Myanmar. 2. Applicant must be a non-profit-making organization with demonstrated ability to operate as a local NGO in Myanmar, or in exceptional circumstances a private sector company or government body with a specific advantage in organising forest and farm producer groups. 3. Applicant must support efforts by producers to themselves organise business groups. 4. Applicant must offer support in ways that create an incentive for sustainable forest management (including all types of forest: natural, plantation and agroforestry). This may either involve producer groups selling sustainable forest products or producer groups selling agricultural crops where the income generation can be shown to reduce pressure for forest clearance. Proposals focusing only on agricultural landscapes and producer groups, without a direct link to the forest, will be rejected. 5. Applicant must have a bank account registered in the name of his or her organization.

Selection criteria 1. Degree to which producers have participated in the design and formulation of the application; higher involvement will be preferred. 2. Degree of consistency of the application with the FFF’s strategy to support organization of producers for business development. 3. Quality of the application in terms of:  Design: logical structure, technical soundness, feasibility;  Competence and capacity of the applicant(s) to undertake the proposed activities;  Complementarity and coordination with existing and/or foreseen development programmes supported from internal or external sources;  Sustainability;  Incorporation of training and learning processes. 4. Impact of the proposed grant in terms of: social, economic, and environmental benefits relating to the sustainable delivery, by producer group businesses, of goods and services from forest landscapes. 5. The financial value for money offered by the proposal – including any co-financing contributions (could be in-kind) from the applicants own financial resources. Annex 2

PROPOSAL TEMPLATE

The proposal must not exceed 4 pages A4 size with Time New Roman font size 11 and 2 cm margins excluding Annex (mentioned below).

1. Title: please provide a short title of your proposed project.

2. Prepared by: please give legal name of your organization and its mandate in one sentence.

3. Overall objective: please describe in one sentence what you hope to achieve, with whom and where.

4. Location and beneficiaries: please provide the specific location (villages, townships) where the projects activities would take place and the number of beneficiaries.

5. Objectives and activities: please describe in numbered paragraphs the specific objectives (or results) you would want to see and the activities you would carry out to achieve them. There should be no more than four objectives. For example:

Objective 1: Inventory of potential local products in six focal communities on which a business could be developed.

Activities: 1.1 Hire a business or agricultural development specialist. 1.2 Carry out field visits and interviews in all six communities. 1.3 Assess potential products based on their costs in terms of labor and capital, income generation potential, social and environmental impacts, and other relevant criteria.

6. Track record of applicant: please describe why your organization is best placed to do this work, including specific previous relevant experience.

7. Personnel: please provide the names of the key personnel (or experts) who would be involved in the project and their roles in the project.

8. Budget: please provide a cost breakdown by each activity the project would consist of using the template in Annex 3. Upon signature of the contract (Letter of Agreement), FFF would advance 60% of the agreed budget in a first payment and would pay the balance of 40% in a second payment after it has accepted and approved the technical and financial reports submitted by the applicant’s organization, which therefore will need to have sufficient financial capacity to finalize the project prior to receiving the second payment. The contract will be issued by FAO Rome.

Annex: on not more than 2 pages, provide information on your organization as follows:  Short history  Main objectives and mandates  Organisational structure  Membership  Contact details: complete address, telephone, email, and website  Name and contact details of the person in charge of the project Annex 3

BUDGET TEMPLATE (below is an EXAMPLE)

Please prepare the budget of your project proposal according to the following template, which breaks down the costs by activity, and specifies the number of units and unit cost for each cost:

Financial contributions by FAO to cover activities Cost in USD Objective 1: Conduct a stakeholder identification and analysis 1.1 Prepare a study for the identification and analysis of stakeholders at the Chiefdom level, 3 000 District level and County levels: 10 local travels to the County, 3 persons at USD25/person, total transport USD750; DSA for 3 persons for 10 days at USD25/day, total DSA USD750; 1 expert at USD500 per month for 3 months. Sub-Total 3 000 Objective 2: Preparation material for awareness raising on County Forest Forum 2.1 Four workshops at county level: local travel for 4 workshops each with 25 persons at 1 600 USD5/person, total transport USD500; DSA for 1 facilitator for 1 day at USD50/day; accommodation for 1 facilitator for 1 day at USD25; rental of workshop venues at USD50; DSA for 4 workshops each with 25 persons at USD5/day, total DSA 500; essential supplies USD100. 2.2 Prepare a document with key issues: 1expert at USD200 per month for 1 month. 200 Sub-Total 1 800 Objective 3: Setting up and implementation of the County Forest Forum 3.1 Prepare a document with the agreement of the County Forestry Forum: 1 expert at 925 USD500 per month for 1 month; rental of workshop venues at USD50; local travel for the workshop 25 persons at USD10/person, total transport USD250, DSA for 1 workshop with 25 persons at USD5/day, total DSA USD125. 3.2 Drafting constitution and by-laws: 1 expert at USD500 per month for 2 months 1 000 3.3 Vetting draft constitution and bye law: Rental of 3 workshops venues at USD50; local 1 335 travel for each workshop 25 persons at USD10/person, total transport USD750, DSAs for each workshop with 25 persons at USD5/day, total DSA USD375; essential supplies USD60. 3.4 Workshop to adopt the constitution, by-law and the launching of the County Forest 425 Forum: Rental of workshop venues at USD50; local travel for the workshop 25 persons at USD10/person, total transport USD250, DSAs for the workshop with 25 persons at USD5/day, total DSA USD125. 3.5 Preparation of the strategic plan and sources of funding: 1 expert at USD650 per month 650 for 1 month 3.6 Workshop to present the fully functioning CFF: Rental of workshop venues at USD50; 425 local travel for the workshop, 25 persons at USD10/person, total transport USD250, DSA for the workshop with 25 persons at USD5/day, total DSA USD125. 3.7 Case study of the experiences with documentation on lessons learnt: Organization’s 300 regular personnel used for agreed activity at USD300 per month for 1 month Sub-Total 5 060 TOTAL 9 860