National Consultant for the Development of Proposal and Roadmap

The Purpose, objectives, and key tasks of the assignment are as follows:

Purpose

To develop a comprehensive National Care Programme Proposal and roadmap that provides a strategic and implementable framework for strengthening Bhutans care economy by improving access to quality and affordable care services, recognizing, reducing and redistributing unpaid care work, creating decent care employment opportunities, and contributing to gender equality, social inclusion, human development, and long-term economic resilience. The roadmap should outline costing that is fiscally realistic, institutionally anchored, and suitable for phased implementation.

Objectives - The consultant will:

 Assess Bhutans care ecosystem and future care needs, including policies, services, institutional arrangements, financing mechanisms, care infrastructure, workforce capacities, and key gaps across childcare, eldercare, disability support, and long-term care.

Identify priority care needs and opportunities arising from demographic, social, economic, and gender dynamics, including measures to recognize, reduce, redistribute, reward, and represent care work, particularly unpaid care and domestic work.

Develop a National Care Programme Proposal and costed implementation plan that sets out strategic priorities, interventions, financing options, governance and institutional arrangements, partnerships, workforce development strategies, and pathways for expanding quality care services and decent care employment.

Scope of work

The consultant will undertake the following tasks:

·         Conduct a desk review of relevant national policies, strategies, studies, assessments, and data related to care, gender equality, social protection, health, disability inclusion, ageing, labour markets, and human development.

·         Review international and regional good practices on care economy programming and care systems strengthening, with a focus on contexts relevant to Bhutan.

·         Map existing care services, programmes, institutions, financing mechanisms, and stakeholders across government, civil society, communities, development partners, and the private sector, as well as care recipients such as elderly persons, persons with disabilities and their caregivers among others

·         Conduct consultations with relevant stakeholders to identify priority challenges, opportunities, and potential programme interventions.

·         Analyze policy, institutional, financing, service delivery, and workforce gaps that constrain the development of a comprehensive care system.

·         Develop a National Care Programme Proposal outlining the situational analysis, priority actions and indicative cost. The proposal should include a phased prioritized implementation of roadmap covering immediate institutional and policy measures, short-term pilot interventions, medium-term expansion, and longer-term national scale-up. For each proposed action, the roadmap should identify the lead and supporting institutions, target population and geographic coverage, implementation timeframe, indicative cost and potential financing source, expected outputs and outcomes, key assumptions and risks, and clear criteria for assessing readiness for expansion or national scale-up

·         Facilitate validation of the draft proposal with relevant stakeholders and incorporate feedback into the final document.