| Description |
INTERNATIONAL CONSULTANCY TO DESIGN AND ESTABLISH A NATIONAL TOURISM ADAPTATION PLATFORM TO SUPPORT EFFECTIVE PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS FOR CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION IN THE MALDIVIAN TOURISM SECTOR
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| Location : |
Male', MALDIVES |
| Application Deadline : |
30-Apr-13 |
| Type of Contract : |
Individual Contract |
| Post Level : |
International Consultant |
Languages Required :
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English |
Starting Date :
(date when the selected candidate is expected to start) |
10-Apr-2013 |
| Duration of Initial Contract : |
2 months |
| Expected Duration of Assignment : |
2 months |
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Background
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The tourism sector of the Maldives contributes greatly to the country’s economy. The sector is one of the most important providers of employment in the country. The sector maintains critical economic linkages with remote and highly dispersed inhabited islands, and is linked to a diverse range of value chains and opportunities related to agriculture, fisheries, manufacturing, construction, transport, communication, energy, water and waste management.
Climate change undermines the resilience, viability and profitability of the tourism and its value chains, both directly and indirectly. In spite of the evident impact of climate-related events on the tourism sector, monitoring for compliance with existing laws and regulations are not properly carried out, not enforced, and often left for the industry to self-regulate. In addition, since adaptation is not integrated into policy and planning instruments of the tourism sector, there is little or no adoption of climate-smart planning and investment practices. A number of tourism operators still employ water, waste and energy management practices which keep damaging the natural capacity of the sensitive reef ecosystem to adapt, which continue to render tourism value chains vulnerable to climate-related shocks and stresses.
Tourism operators lack knowledge and guidance on how to apply no-regrets adaptation options in relation to the management of waste, freshwater and energy resources on resort islands to increase the resilience of the tourism sector. The Government of Maldives lacks an institutional platform and incentive mechanisms to encourage, stimulate and facilitate public-private partnerships for climate change adaptation in tourism resorts and associated communities.
In response to this nationally prioritized challenge, the government of Maldives, in partnership with UNDP, has developed the project tilted “Increasing Climate Change Resilience of Maldives through Adaptation in the Tourism Sector” that is currently under implementation and financed from the GEF/LDCF. To encourage adaption in the tourism sector, one of the proposed activities of the project is to establish a National Tourism Adaptation Platform to support effective public-private investment partnerships for climate change adaptation in the tourism sector.
Purpose of the Consultancy
The purpose of this consultancy is to design and establish a national platform that will promote and guide adaptation to climate change in the tourism industry of Maldives.
Background to scope of works
The current Tourism Master Plan indicates the requirement for all tourist resorts to have an environmental management system. However, technical guidance on low carbon and climate resilient environmental management is not provided, and recommendations for no-regrets adaptation measures in the field of freshwater management, wastewater management, solid waste management and energy management are missing.
Currently, environmental management practices vary greatly among resorts and there is considerable variation between them in the level of climate risk resilience. Some resorts have well-developed natural resource management systems which could be described as climate-smart, while others lack the capacity to adopt resilient and environmentally friendly waste, water and energy management practices.
Although various autonomous and ad-hoc planned adaptation measures have been adopted on individual islands (with mixed results), the lessons from these initiatives are neither systematically evaluated nor disseminated. Cooperation between tourist resorts and neighboring tourism-associated communities remains limited, and access to knowledge emerging from different adaptation projects and approaches remains mostly informal. Although there are some few public private partnership projects implemented, these partnerships remain dependant on the goodwill of individual resorts and are not systematically promoted and facilitated.
Overall, the flow of useful information that could potentially increase the quality of adaptation planning by tourist developers, operators and associated communities remains limited. As there is presently no knowledge management mechanism that would allow the systematic capturing and dissemination of lessons learned from different climate change adaptation projects, there is no mechanism/tool for different tourist developers, operators, government departments, atoll administrations, island councils and local development planners to devise, monitor and analyze concrete adaptation projects. The lack of public-private partnerships on tourism adaptation means that insufficient private sector investment in concrete adaptation measures is leveraged, and that the adoption of adaptive practices by the tourism sector and associate communities remains under-critical and invisible.
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Duties and Responsibilities
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The scope of work for the consultancy will include, but not necessarily be limited to, the following activities:
Establishing the Maldivian Tourism Adaptation Platform
- Identify relevant individuals in the government, NGOs and the private sector who have a stake in tourism-related policy analysis, formulation, monitoring, capacity development and investment to formulate a list of members and institutions who should be the stakeholders of the Maldivian Tourism Adaptation Platform (MTAP).
- Develop roles and responsibilities for the stakeholder institutions.
- Develop ideal institutional composition, structure and mandate for MTAP.Identify existing coordination mechanisms/institutions that has the potential to take on the role of Maldivian Tourism Adaptation Platform (MTAP)
- With the approval of the Technical Committee of the Tourism Adaptation Project, select the most suitable exiting mechanism/institution and suggest relevant institutional and operational changes to effectively incorporate the mandate and responsibilities of MTAP.Identify international partners that MTAP can work with to enhance its capabilities.
- Formulate standard operation procedures that include yearly meeting requirements and reporting requirements.
Promoting adaptation in the tourism sector through MTAP
- Develop an action plan that includes specific activities and a workplan for MTAP to promote adaptation in the area of freshwater management, wastewater management, solid waste management and energy management in the tourism sector.
- Identify and develop action plans on how MTAP can lobby for implementation of changes to the laws and regulations suggested in the reports produced under the output 1 of the TAP project that include :
- Review of existing documents on adaption and maladaptive practices in tourism sector
- Economic evaluation of climate risk in the tourism sector and dependent communities
- Revision of existing laws and regulation to incentivize private sector investment for climate change adaptation in the tourism sector
- Addendum to the national building code in reference to infrastructure in resorts
- Guidelines to climate proof and adapt freshwater and waste water
- Guidelines to climate proof and adapt solid waste management
Establishing a small grants mechanism in MTAP
- Develop eligibility guidelines, review criteria, etc for a transparent small grants mechanism that will be used by MTAP to solicit adaptation proposals by the tourism industry, review tourism adaptation ideas, and allocate small seed grants to leverage private sector investment in adaptation.
- Design and document mechanisms for MTAP to assist implementation of projects supported MTAP
- Design and document mechanisms for reviewing and monitoring of projects supported by MTAP to analyze and communicate lessons learned from tourism adaptation projects.
Promotion of MTAP
- Design and document a plan to promote MTAP to ensure participation from relevant stakeholders.
- Design and deliver training and awareness raising workshop/s to the key stakeholders in order to disseminate information about the purpose, operational procedures, roles and responsibilities of the stakeholders.
Outputs
The consultant shall provide the following outputs:
Inception report
With an initial review, the consultant shall identify policies, legal instruments, institutional frameworks and stakeholders which have relevance to the issues identified under the headings
- Project background,
- Purpose of consultancy,
- Background to scope of works
- Scope of works of this TOR.
Following the initial review, the consultant shall prepare a provisional list of law, regulations policies and reports that are to be reviewed and stakeholders and institutions that are to be interviewed. These would be finalized in consultation with the National Project Director (NPD) and the National Project Manager (NPM). For each document reviewed, the consultant shall identify specific references to the text, and construct a brief summary record according to a template agreed with the NPD and the NPM. Where possible, links should be added to relevant policy websites. Similar procedure should be followed for the interviews.
Following the initial review, the consultant shall;
- Study and review relevant background materials and hold initial discussions with project stakeholders;
- Write-up an Inception report of 10 - 12 pages comprising:
- the Consultant’s understanding of the consultancy and prescribed tasks;
- the proposed detailed technical approach;
- the proposed detailed work plan/timeline;
- identification of issues crucial to the viability of the consultancy; and
- detailed comments on this TOR. Subsequently, if required and approved by the project team, the TOR can be adjusted in response to the Inception Note.
- Submit Inception report to project team for approval or revision. The Inception report should include short synthetic commentaries highlighting significant points and themes for each section.
Powerpoint presentation
The consultant should conduct interviews with relevant stakeholders as planned in the inception note and in accordance with the technical approach proposed by the consultant. These interviews should gather information about the perception of the stakeholders towards the establishments of the Maldivian Tourism Adaptation Platform and their input on the best institutional arrangements and operational procedures. Also, these interviews should gather inputs from the stakeholders on how to promote adaptation through MTAP and establish the small grants mechanism.
The consultant should present the findings of these meetings to the Technical Committee of the Tourism Adaptation Project and incorporate the feedback of the committee into the final report.
Draft Detailed Report
The Draft Detailed report should include the documents needed for the following as described in the Scope of Work section:
- Establishment of the MTAP
- Promotion of adaptation in the tourism sector through MTAP
- Establishment of a small grants mechanism in MTAP
- Promotion of MTAP
- The report should be divided in to the above four sections
Outcome document of Training Workshop
The consultant should conduct a training workshop for the stakeholders on the operational procedures of the Maldivian Tourism Adaptation Platform and the small grants mechanism. In the workshop the feedback of the stakeholders on how to strengthen the platform should be gathered by discussing the action plans with the stakeholders.
The consultant should produce an outcome report of the training workshop that documents the feedbacks of the participants and corresponding comments of the consultant to the feedbacks.
Outcome document of the first meeting of MTAP
With the assistance of the PMU, the consultant should facilitate the first meeting of the Tourism Adaptation Platform and guide the stakeholders on relevant discussions.
The consultant should produce the outcome document of this meeting that includes the discussions and decisions made captured in the reporting formats designed under the output 3.
Final report
Comments on the draft detailed report should be received from the Technical Committee of the TAP project and the final report should be formulated with the reflection of these comments and feedbacks received from the training workshop and the first meeting of TAP.
The reports should be presented in English, and in a concise style (rather than as an academic report) that could be used by the policy makers as well as the resort owners, investors and managers. The structure and the overall organization of the reports should be consistent with similar reports. The consultant may also submit a format for the structure and organization of the reports to the Project Management Unit (PMU) for approval by the Ministry of Tourism Arts and Culture and UNDP.
Deliverables
- Draft Inception note.
- Final Inception Note
- PowerPoint Presentation
- Draft Detailed report
- Outcome document of Training Workshop
- Outcome document of the first meeting of MTAP
- Final Detailed Report
Reporting and Payments
- The structure/format of the reports must be in line with internationally recognised standards. Suggested draft structure/format to be approved by project team;
- All draft documents should be in Microsoft Word and all final documents in Adobe Acrobat format; and
- All documents should be free from access restrictions
- The payments shall be contingent upon the successful completion of the deliverables/milestones as outlined in the contract.
Inputs
UNDP Maldives
- Provide relevant background information including copies of relevant documents;
- Participate in the field visits and workshops;
- Provide input on draft documents:
Government of Maldives
- Make travel and meeting arrangements
- Provide relevant background information including copies of relevant documents;
- Participate in the field visits and workshops;
- Provide input on draft documents:
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Competencies
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Functional Competencies:
- Proven analytical and inter-personal skills.
- Research and evaluation skills including ability to synthesize information
- Excellent oral, and effective presentation and report-writing skills;
- Ability to work under with minimum supervision, while meeting deadlines.
- Excellent social and communication skills
- Ability to work in multi-disciplinary and multi-cultural settings
- Excellent computers skills required
Corporate Competencies:
- Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
- Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP;
- Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability
- Treats all people fairly without favoritism;
- Fulfills all obligations to gender sensitivity and zero tolerance for sexual harassment
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Required Skills and Experience
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Education:
- A Master’s degree in sustainable tourism, or related field with focus on on tourism and Environment.
Experience:
- Knowledgeable and experience in climate change adaptation measures
- At least 7-10 years of experience in the field of climate change adaptation in the tourism sector.
- Excellent communication skills (written & oral English) are an essential requirement.
- Sound analytic and technical competence in analyzing and proffering solutions to environmental problems.
- Knowledge of the tourism industry particularly the resorts and tourism dependent communities in small island states.
Language Requirements:
- Fluency in both written and spoken English.
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