Terms of Reference

Senior Qualitative Researcher on Outcome Harvesting and Gender Most Significant Changes studies

Role: Qualitative Researcher in Hanoi, Viet Nam

*note: only Vietnamese-speaking candidates are eligible for this position

Reports to: Principal Investigators, Hanoi

Work type: Contractor

Location: Ma, Yen Bai, Viet Nam and other field locations tbd in Yen Bai province

Duration:  mid-May through August

1.     Overview of the organization:

The Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) delivers research-based solutions that harness agricultural biodiversity and sustainably transform food systems to improve people’s lives. Alliance solutions address the global crises of malnutrition, climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental degradation. With novel partnerships, the Alliance generates evidence and mainstreams innovations to transform food systems and landscapes so that they sustain the planet, drive prosperity, and nourish people in a climate crisis.

The Alliance is part of CGIAR, a global research partnership for a food-secure future. We have several on-going projects in the agricultural and land use sector that seek to prepare low-income farmers for more climate change resilience production. One of these is the Climate Change and Food Security (CCAFS) project on scaling out the Climate Smart Villages.

2.   Project Description

Ma Village in Yen Bai province of Vietnam was the main implementation site for the Climate Smart Village (CSV) approach in northern Vietnam from 2014-2019.

It was one village within the CCAFS programme to establish Climate Smart Villages globally, including establishment of 7 CSVs across Southeast Asia, in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and the Philippines.

The CSVs across Southeast Asia followed very different locally-appropriate approaches, but share some common components, including: 

• Identification and testing of Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) technologies (e.g. improved rice varieties, intercropping, grass strips, vermicompost and live bedding)
• Adaptation support mechanisms (community facilities, input materials, climate information)
• Participatory knowledge generation and sharing (learning groups, field days, peer-to-peer trainings)
• Partners (research institutions, local authorities, provincial authorities) providing support

Experiences on CCAFS Southeast Asia adaptation of the CSV approach are being synthesized to generate learnings on how to more effectively build climate resilience in rural agricultural communities.

With this RFP, we seek an experienced Qualitative Researcher to lead the Viet Nam component of the assessment. The assessment will focus on the contributions (or lack thereof) of project interventions to changes in knowledge, attitudes, practice or other perceptions and behaviors among community men and women.

3.     Scope of Work

The scope of the work for Viet Nam will focus only on the CSV site of Ma Village in Yen Bai province. The work will be divided roughly into 4 stages as follows:

Stage 1 – Synthesis of existing baseline and instrument definition (May 2021, 5-7 days estimated)

The Qualitative Researcher will review the existing data from a quantitative survey conducted in October 2019 to build an understanding of the Ma experience to date.

The Qualitative Researcher will work with the other members of the project team located in the Philippines and Laos to adapt the research methodology to the context of Ma Village, and lead research tool development (interview guides, focus group discussion guides) and translation into Vietnamese language.

Stage 2 – Pre-fieldwork: Research and ethics training, including IRB training and data management (June 2021, 5 days estimated)

The Qualitative Researcher will lead the research associates through on-boarding and research and ethics training, including IRB training and data management. This will include field-based trial runs on how to conduct empathy interviews. This is a required pre-fieldwork activity that will prepare the research associates for the next stages.

Stage 3 – Qualitative Research on Outcome Harvesting and Gender Most Significant Changes (June-July 2021, 15 days estimated)

• Schedule meetings, conduct interviews and lead focus group discussion with local intervention beneficiaries, their family members, other community members (non-beneficiaries), and local commune and province level officials. Conduct two types of field work:
  
  • Outcome Harvesting: Use key informant interviews and focus group discussions to identify specific changes in agricultural services and policies, in socio-economic status of farming and fishing households, in local crops, livestock and/or fisheries markets, and in knowledge attitude and practices of key CSV decision makers.
  • Gender Most Significant Changes: Follow the Most Significant Change approach developed by Davies & Dart (2004) to gather richer and more detailed stories of gender-related changes experienced with regard to access, empowerment, representation, burdens or otherwise to men and women at the field level.
• Oversee and quality-check the translation and transcription of notes from audio recordings and other field notes from Vietnamese into English.
• Maintain a field-work diary, keeping a record of the main events and issues arising in the field during interviews and other field observations.

Stage 4 – Synthesis and Reporting on Results (July 2021, 10 days estimated)

The Qualitative Researcher will lead debriefing sessions, reflection and synthesis of learnings with other members of the project team in Viet Nam, Laos and the Philippines. Most significant changes and findings will be agreed with the project team.

The results of the study will be written up in a final report following the same outline format adopted from the other project sites.

4.   Required skills and qualifications

Qualified candidates are those with University degrees in the social sciences, including anthropology, sociology, geography, economics. Other eligible candidates include those with degrees in agronomy and agricultural science with significant experience doing qualitative research. Previous experience in rural development work and leading rural field work team will be useful in executing this work.

Required:

• Knowledge and experience implementing ad-hoc/semi-structured qualitative research methods (interviews, focus group discussions)
• Strong communication, facilitation skills
• Empathetic listener, open-minded and responsive to participants
• Professional proficiency in written and spoken English and Vietnamese
• IT skills (Microsoft suite)
• Availability to undertake fieldwork (including travel) for the time period of the project.
• Pro-active and able to lead a small research team to execute the work

Desirable:

• Experience with research on agriculture or rural development
• Solid understanding of the Vietnamese rural context for collecting data (e.g., local regulations, social norms, etc.)
• Knowledge or completed training in research ethics for research on human subjects preferred

5.   How to Apply

Interested offerors are invited to submit:

• Covering letter of interest describing interest in the opportunity and ability to work on above mentioned tasks and timelines
• CV of the primary Senior Qualitative Researcher
• At least 1 and not more than 3 samples of prior related work that best demonstrates ability to complete the terms of reference described above
• Cost quotation by type (personnel, travel, other operations)

Please send via email to [email protected] and with copy to [email protected].

Deadline for submission: On or before May 10, 2021

Organization: CIAT
Location: Hanoi
Application deadline: 2021-05-10
Send application to: [email protected]; [email protected]