Capacity Assessment of Implementing Partners of the Somalia Humanitarian Fund

1. Introduction The United Nations is seeking expression of interest from competent and qualified companies for the provision of capacity assesment services for the Somalia Humanitarian Fund (SHF). 2. Background The Somalia Humanitarian Fund was established in 2010 as an upgrade of the Humanitarian Response Fund (HRF), with the aim to: - Strategically fund assessed humanitarian action in Somalia to improve the timeliness and coherence of the humanitarian response; - Support priority clusters and regional priorities in accordance with the identified needs. Since its inception, the SHF received more than US$400 million in contributions from donors and funded more than 800 projects across Somalia. The SHF is funding activities in an environment which is often highly volatile and only partially accessible due to security constraints. Consequently, ensuring that assistance provided reaches those in greatest need has been particularly challenging in this context. In this regard, the SHF Accountability Framework was set up to further improve fund management and increase the accountability towards the affected population, donors and other stakeholders by introducing the risk management approach to the SHF. Capacity Assessment is one of the main components of the Accountability Framework, next to reporting, audit and monitoring, which jointly assure that the prioritisation for oversight and verification of the activities and outputs is based on a systematised risk analysis of partners, locations and activities. Capacity Assessment aims to determine whether an Implementing Partner has a sufficient level of institutional, managerial, financial and technical capacity to be considered for eligibility using a standardized assessment process. 3. Scope and Deliverables The UN is seeking a contractor to conduct Capacity Assessments of up to 90 SHF Implementing Partners, in a timeframe of 36 months, under the overall supervision of the UN. Capacity Assessment of each Implementing Partner shall cover the following areas: organizational information, technical capacity, funding, coordination and partnerships, financial management, human resources, logistics and monitoring and evaluation. The locations were assessments will have to be carried out include, but shall not be limited to: Somalia (South-Central, Puntland, and Somaliland) and Nairobi, Kenya . Following are the key deliverables: a) Initial draft capacity assessment reports for each Implementing Partner, detailing methodology, objective and scope, timelines, observations and recommendations. b) Final digitally signed capacity assessment individual reports for each Implementing Partner. c) A report on lessons learned reflecting on possible improvements on methodology, tools, process and feedback. 4. EOI Instructions/Remarks Companies that wish to participate in the upcoming tender are requested to submit their Expression of Interest (EOI) as per below instructions, and to duly register in the United Nations Global Marketplace (www.ungm.org). Vendors are advised that this EOI does not constitute a solicitation. The UN reserves the right to change or cancel this requirement at any time during the EOI and/or solicitation process.