Request For Aga Khan Foundation - Afghanistan
Request For Market Assessment for Marketable skills in Kunduz, Balkh, Badakhshan and Takhar provinces
- Rationale: AKF Afghanistan’s (AKF (Afg)) is looking for an experienced and qualified Individual/firm (hereafter referred to as “consultant”) to conduct a labour market assessment under LITACA III project. The consultant should apply appropriate methodology and approach to conduct context analysis, market relevant data and in-depth analysis which should enable suggestions and recommendations for marketable skills and facilitate vocation training interventions under this project. Also the consultant will be asked to include income related questions in their tools and establish baseline for some of the LITACA III’s indicators. The report of analysis will be used to inform project interventions, particularly the vocational training and provide relevant context and baseline for the project indicators. The reports will be shared with donors and other relevant stakeholders in the form of presentation and narrative report.
- Project Background:
Active in Afghanistan since 2002, AKF (Afg) delivers integrated multi-input development programs in eight provinces of the country's 34 provinces. With over 2,000 staff members engaged in 53 districts, AKF (Afg) focuses on community development and governance, civil society, market development, natural resource management, infrastructure, education, and health. AKF’s vision of Afghanistan is a stable, peaceful and more prosperous country where resilient communities have access to quality basic services and the knowledge and tools to uphold inclusive and effective institutions to support a democratic and pluralistic society.
The AKF (Afg) is part of the Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN), a group of private, international, non-denominational agencies founded by His Highness the Aga Khan. As the overall goal of the AKDN is “To improve quality of life) in the areas where its member institutions operate.
About LITACA
LITACA project helps start-ups by providing equipment and supporting marketing, labelling, design, and export. The beneficiaries are small and medium farmers, agro-processors, handicrafts producers (individual and cooperatives), cooperatives, traders (wholesalers, retailers, small and medium size enterprises) in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. The focus in on vulnerable women, unemployed youth, and people with disabilities.
This project will follow the two broad strategies 1) Creation of sustainable livelihoods and support on income increase, that is expected to support livelihoods that can cope with and recover from the stresses and shocks and maintain or enhance capabilities and assets both now and in the future without undermining the natural resource base. These services provided by LITACA include vocational training to improve the skills of farmers, entrepreneurs, migrants, disabled, unemployed young people and women with the aims to produce and trade goods that are in demand in the local markets. These groups will be more qualified to access employment opportunities that will have a positive effect on income and will form the basis for local economic growth, and. 2) Market creation for LITACA products and promoting cross-border cooperation, which is intended to build capacities of communities and local organizations to establish and maintain cross-border markets, cross-border forums, fairs, B2B meetings. Capacities, to develop and implement gender responsive campaigns related to cross-border dialogue will be strengthened. People living in these cross-border areas to have better access to larger markets for trade and more opportunities for partnerships to increase the value of local businesses and make communities in the region more resilient to insecurity and instability.
Scope of work / Overall objective:
The overall objective of the Labor Market Assessment (LMA) is to assess the demand and supply aspects of the labor market and to provide recommendation for increasing job opportunities for job seeker group. In the provincial capitals and 9 districts of 4 target provinces (Balkh, Kunduz, Takhar and Badakhshan).
- Work Location (s):
- Kunduz Province (Kunduz City, Imam Sahib, and Qala-e-Zal Districts).
- Takhar Province (Taliqan City, Yang-e-Qala, Dasht-e-Qala and Cha hap Districts).
- Badakhshan Province (Fiza abad City, Khawan, Shar-e-Bozorg Districts).
- Balkh Province (Mazar-e-Sharif City, Kaldar and Khulm Districts).
- Main duties and responsibilities:
- Conduct a quick and comprehensive context analysis with focus on political and economic situation by using available and secondary data.
- Define and apply appropriate methodology and develop tools for exploring existing and potential jobs opportunities.
- Measure LITACA’s indicators and establish baseline for those that don’t have the baseline or require validation.
- Produce high quality report, and presentation based on the findings and recommend marketable vocations to be considered.
- Hiring of surveyor and selecting university students, capacity building and coordinating the activities.
The individuals/firms are expected to use and apply both quantitative and qualitative research methods as part of mixed research approaches. Both the quantitative and qualitative parts/approaches will need to be well elaborated on how practically to use/apply them in relation to the pre-defined assessment/study objective(s). Moreover, a matrix would also be useful to further illustrate the proposed research approaches against each indicator for the required nature of data. Furthermore, the related sampling approaches and methods would also need to be well-defined and proposed in the light of the proposed research methods and needed data for the set of pre-defined indicators. This may also further need a quick illustration of the proposed study tools where more indications may be needed to propose the required nature and number of both quant and qual research tools. Therefore, the assignment will include desk review, individual interviews, KIIs, FGDs and making use of secondary data available with other stakeholders including market actors.
- Deliverables:
- The key deliverables for this assignments are as below:
- Comprehensive inception report, outlining the methodology, tools, field plan, coordination and communication plan and risk matrix.
- Enumerator recruitment and training
- Quality assurance mechanism and routine catch up meetings with AKF to report on the progress.
- Complete data set and data analysis, including any dashboard, graphs or diagram related to study.
- Frist narrative report for AKF’s review
- Finalized report including the data analysis, recommendations and etc.
- To recommend interventions, in addition to vocational trainings, to enable the job seekers to get employment
- Power point presentation of final report and findings to AKF team.
Also, there are basically three main components that the study should cover:
Profiling of the labor market in target Provinces
What are the provincial, national, and regional market trends (i.e. supply and demand of labor, wages, migration, etc).
- Engage local youth organizations and university students to collect and analyses data (collection and integration of qualitative and quantitative data and the use of iterative analytic process).
- What are the job opportunities? (i.e. in the agriculture, livestock, construction, or other sectors)
- What means people use to find a job, locally or nationally?
- What are the training needs?
- What are the weaknesses and strengths of the vocational training institutes/higher education institutions?
- What is the gap between the needs of the employers and the skill sets of the available labor force as well as skills that may be needed in the future?
An analysis of migration and remittances trends:
- What kinds of jobs do the labor force migrate for, and where?
- What means do they use to find a job inside or outside of Afghanistan?
- What is the current remittance structure in the target areas? (i.e. what means people use to send remittances back home to their families?)
- What is the coping mechanisms of the families in times of upheavals such as labor unrest or other kinds of events that can disturb the flow of remittances?
- What are the living conditions of those living abroad or out of their home district or province? A medium-term (3-4 years long) implementation strategy
- The implementation plan will help EI address gaps in the labor sector in its target regions (i.e. identifying better-deserving beneficiaries, selecting trades with high employability, and identifying others gaps that needs to be addressed in the sector to improve job prospects of some of the marginal and unskilled community members).