1. BACKGROUND

This Call for Proposals (CfP) is administered by the UNDP DIA Support project which is an integral part of the UNDP Democratic Governance portfolio. Through this portfolio UNDP assists the Government, civil society and the people of Ukraine in advancing democratic policies and practices needed to accelerate progress on sustainable human development. This includes advocating for human rights and gender equality, supporting anti-corruption efforts, promoting the digital transformation agenda, ensuring that all Ukrainian citizens can protect their rights, strengthening parliament, and empowering civil society and youth activists.

Digital, Inclusive, Accessible: Support to Digitalisation of Public Services in Ukraine (DIA Support) Project is implemented with funding provided by the Government of Sweden and in close cooperation with the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine (MDT). Within this three-year intervention, UNDP assists its government counterparts to select a comprehensive set of services that representatives of vulnerable groups require in their life situations, and ensures that these services can be delivered in a digitized or digitally-enhanced, mobile-based form. MDT provides an in-depth understanding of the Human Rights Based Approach in crafting public services for citizen-clients. The Project also works proactively with citizen-clients to enhance their digital skills and their willingness to adopt the solutions offered by new technologies.

The DIA Support Project aims to achieve the following objectives:

• Government institutions gain the knowledge and skills to design and implement policies to digitize citizen-oriented services in line with principles of the Human Rights Based Approach and gender mainstreaming;
• Client-centred digital service packages are built around life situations in a participatory and gender-responsive manner;
• Ukrainian women and men learn  more about the digital and mobile-based services available to them and use more of these services to meet their needs.

Through this CfP, UNDP plans to engage a civil society organisation (CSO) for responding to humanitarian needs of the Ukrainian population representing the most vulnerable groups. Such response will be in a form of independent oversight of the new government digital system regarding logistics, distribution, supply and demand of humanitarian aid. Additionally, the selected CSO will provide daily operational support to ensure the efficiency and transparency of humanitarian assistance in Ukraine. The CSO that will be chosen on a competitive basis is expected to have a solid background in managing or large-scale monitoring of humanitarian assistance distribution. 

The system itself is supported by UNDP and identifies humanitarian aid centres functioning all over Ukraine, as well as the distribution of available resources in a fair and rational way. The digital solution is a unified tool aimed at collecting verified data on the existing volunteer groups and humanitarian centres; charitable foundations located in different regions in Ukraine; supporting internally displaced persons; local territory defence units; people with disabilities; the elderly; and other groups of Ukrainian citizens impacted by the war. 

The centralized database will also enable the national and local governments to conduct needs assessments on a regular basis and distribute humanitarian aid throughout the country. Through the system, all the stakeholders will respond to such challenges as:  

· Organizing an efficient, transparent and comprehensive system of humanitarian assistance interventions for the most vulnerable segments of the population suffering from the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine;

· Assisting Ukrainian authorities at regional/local levels in dealing with humanitarian assistance interventions, especially in close proximity to geographical areas that are massively affected by the military hostilities or in places where the vulnerable population including IDPs has been concentrated;

· Cooperating with all types of stakeholders for ensuring that the humanitarian assistance is provided to those in urgent need in a fair and equal manner with intention to serve the maximum possible number of individuals;

· Contributing to or leading the coordination of all sorts of initiatives in humanitarian assistance domain within its area of operations;

· Strengthening the organizational capacity of local CSOs and volunteer groups, which are willing to contribute to the humanitarian response.

Given the above, the CfP aims to enhance networking between civil society organisations, the government and donors and to facilitate community-based self-help initiatives through the identified digital solution.

2. OBJECTIVES OF THE COMPETITION

The primary focus of this call for proposals is to provide independent oversight and support for the joint efforts of the national government, UNDP and CSOs to ensure efficient oversight and administration of the centralized database related to the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine caused by the war. This open call is essentially aimed at achieving the initiative goals, namely:

1. Provide an independent oversight to system operation and assure that all processes are transparent, unbiased and inclusive, and any potentially corruptive cases are detected and handled by the responsible authority;

2. Collect, verify and submit contact information on all types of actors working in the area of humanitarian response to the respective units for its further uploading to the system;

3. Cooperate with various actors including regional/local authorities, international organisations, CSOs for purpose of information exchange needed to keep the information accurate and up-to-date;

4. Based on the available needs assessment, monitor the distribution of humanitarian aid throughout the country;

5. Gather independent feedback from system’s users and transfer it to UNDP for further communication with the Government and the vendor who is responsible for the technical implementation and maintenance;

6. Conduct ad hoc communication campaigns to disseminate information about interactive digital solutions and services related to the humanitarian aid in Ukraine.

3. PARTICIPANTS OF THE COMPETITION

Non-profit organizations, in particular charitable organizations, public associations (including civil society organizations and unions) that are officially registered in Ukraine. The contest does not provide grants to for-profit organizations, political parties, state authorities, local governments, religious communities and private (physical) individuals and entrepreneurs.

3.1. Eligible organizations

The parameters that will determine whether a CSO is eligible to be considered for funding by UNDP will be based on the Capacity Assessment Checklist CACHE (Annex to the Application Form).

3.2. Geographic location

UNDP will accept applications from all regions of Ukraine.

4. BUDGET AND ALLOWED EXPENSES

Eligible costs must:

· be necessary for caring out project activities;

· comply with the principles of sound financial management, in particular, value for and cost-effectiveness;

· be properly recorded, identifiable and verifiable, and backed by original supporting documents.

UNDP grant may only be used to cover the following costs:

· Staff salaries and expert fees

· Purchase of consultative services provided that these are essential for project goals and objectives;

· Consumables and supplies, including minor personal protective equipment;

· Printing and copying;

· Utility services;

· Renting, catering and other services envisaged by the project activities;

· Travel costs (provided that travel complies with internal UNDP regulations).

The following costs are ineligible:

· Costs of project proposal preparation;

· Debts reconciliation;

· International travel;

· Reimbursement of expenses related to exchange rate fluctuations;

· Creation and registration of the organization;

· Direct fiscal support to state authorities;

· Political activity;

· Religious propaganda;

· Activities leading to direct or indirect discrimination of any social strata;

· Projects aimed at gaining profit from activities;

· Construction or repair work;

· Purchase of vehicles and/or luxury goods and related services;

· Purchase of goods for distribution in the form of humanitarian aid, gifts.

5. SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

On April 14, an information session dedicated to the clarification of the subject and procedures of application regarding this call for proposals will be arranged. All representatives of CSOs interested in participating in the competition will be able to join the information session by sending a request for registration to Oksana Grechko, Digitalisation Policy Specialist of DIA Support project, at oksana.grechko@undp.org. The exact time of the information session will be communicated additionally.  

All applications must be received by UNDP no later than 19 April 2022 by 23:59. Applications arriving after the indicated deadline shall not be considered. Please, do not send attachments exceeding 10 Mb. If the application attachments exceed this size, break the archive up into several parts of under 10 Mb each and indicate accordingly in the e-mail subject (e.g. “Application part 1 of X”).

Please note that UNDP does not send automated replies to your submission (including automated “read receipts” or “delivery receipts”) and does not control what e-mail server responses are sent to the applicants, should they request such automated receipts.

Please expect to receive a human-generated written confirmation from the DIA Support Project. If you receive no such confirmation by 20 April 2022, please contact Oksana Grechko at oksana.grechko@undp.org.

All applications and supporting materials should be sent to grants.ua@undp.org, specifying in the subject line “Consolidated Humanitarian Response in Ukraine”.

Comments on the quality of the proposal are not provided. By submitting materials to UNDP for the competition, the applicant grants UNDP the permission to process personal data contained in resumes/CVs or other parts of the application form for the purposes of the grant competition and potential reference checks.

The winner of the competition will be chosen based on the evaluation results of the project proposals by the Grant Selection Committee.  UNDP will conclude a grant agreement with a finalist that will be recommended for funding.

6. FINANCIAL CONDITIONS AND TERMS OF IMPLEMENTATION

The maximum budget of the project proposal should not exceed 20 000 USD.

The maximum timeframe for the project implementation is 6 months.

The contribution from the implementing organization or from other sources will be considered and will regarded as an advantage for the applicant. This contribution could be made both financially and in non-financial form (for example, remuneration of the personnel of the organization, provision of its office or equipment for project tasks, etc.).

7. SELECTION PROCESS

To ensure full transparency and equity of the process, UNDP forms a Grant Selection Committee (SC) that will appraise the proposals. SC is a temporary authorized body that is responsible for considering, selecting and recommending a proposal for funding. The Selection Committee may decide to request additional independent expert opinion during the selection process.

The proposals shall be assessed by the GSC in accordance to the following criteria:

· Quality and responsiveness of the project proposal to the envisaged activities highlighted in item 2 of this CFP;

· Demonstrated ability of the proposed team to cope with the scope of works described in the project proposal;

· Demonstrated human rights and gender considerations of the project;

· Quality of the proposed networks (including the scope of partners proposed for implementation and already existing networks linked to the lead applicant);

· Experience in distributing or monitoring of humanitarian aid in Ukraine.

8. REPORTING, MONITORING AND EVALUATION

8.1. Monitoring and evaluation, frameworks for project implementation

The Grantee is responsible for monitoring project implementation and evaluating its results. UNDP will monitor the project through Grantee reports, online consultations, site visits, meetings with project personnel and stakeholders, and participation in project events.

8.2. Reporting

The Grantee shall submit the following reports according to UNDP format:

· Brief reports on demand occasionally requested by UNDP in cases when information on Programme implementation is required in between reporting periods;

· A Completion report, including a summary of activities and results as well as financial report for total duration of an agreement.

Annexes:

Application form

Annexes