Implementing Partnership for Upgrading Informal Apprenticeships Training Systems

PROSPECTS partnership

• Under “Partnership for Improving Prospects for Forcibly Displaced Persons and Host Communities” (PROSPECTS) project supported by the Government of the Netherlands, the ILO also partners with UNICEF, UNHCR, WB and IFC to develop a joint and fully integrated approach to respond to the forced displacement situation. In Sudan, the Partnership, focuses on delivering change within the South Sudanese refugee and host community populations in East Darfur, specifically Assalayaa settlement and El Nimir camp and West Kordofan, specifically along the Keilak Kharasana corridor and in the remote El Meiram settlements.

Background

The development challenges facing Sudan are numerous, but at the heart of the problem is how to sustain and accelerate economic growth, and translate that growth into improved opportunities for the vast majority of the country’s population living under extreme conditions of informality. In Sudan, the formal labour market accommodates only a small and decreasing portion of the economically active population. Salaried jobs offer no answer to the growing demand for more and more jobs. Unemployment among youth, between 15 and 24 years of age (more than 60% of the population) is particularly high and increased by two percentage points between 2009 and 2014 (WB, 2020, see figure below). In the PROSPECTS targeted states of East Darfur and West Kordofan, extreme informality creates some of thehighest reported unemployment rates in the country, only preceded by larger urban centres.

It has increasingly becoming obvious that in PROSPECTS operational locations, a majority of the working age FDP and HC population - and especially youth -will obtain income/revenue from engagement in the informal economy. Informal self-employment and/or informal wage employment have been confirmed in recent baseline data assessments; as well as the pervasiveness of informal enterprises; operating in a large and growing informal economy.

Skills enhancement for more women and men can help countries move to a virtuous circle of higher productivity, employment, income growth and development. Yet, the current TVET system has tended to cater for those who have graduated from formal general education system and as such there are significant barriers to the majority of the population; especially for those that have an incomplete secondary education. Many young working age Sudanese face additional barriers to access technical and trades based training opportunities due to living far away from one of the few operational training centres in East Darfur or West Kordofan states.

Where vocational training programmes do exist, the quality of training has been sub-optimal and slow to adapt to changes in the market.  For these reasons, informal skills acquisition trainings – specifically informal apprenticeships –have widespread use in Sudan. In the PROSPECTS target states, skills-related data sampling in PROSPECTS locations strongly suggest that the informal apprenticeship training systemaccounts for over 80% of the responsesas to where skills were obtained. The ILOs PROSPECTS interventions have been designed around identifying what embryonic informal apprenticeship training-related assets exists at the local operational level and to look for points of entry to strengthen that training system via the introduction of productivity enhancing technologies, product-oriented production and learning techniques, conditions required for training benchmarks, workshop level occupational safety and health commitments, and other ‘quality improvements’ to the instructional process.

ILO PROSPECTS Baseline Survey Results for Where Were Skills Acquired

(Source: PROSPECTS baseline survey)

Efforts made to strengthen the existing uncoordinated informal apprenticeship training system in PROSPECTS locationsAND to improve the learning/working conditions that are typically found at the workshop level will help the ILO to introduce new technologies, equipment, production practices, and product design options that will result in improved market product options and potential income/revenue streams. However, in order to obtain the benefits expected from this approach, a number of operational constraints need to be addressed.

It is important to emphasize that under the ILO’s PROSPECTS project, the Organization has committed to working in a number of deep field locations in East Darfur and West Kordodan. In these remote locations a number of parameters shape intervention design considerations. First, the skeletal profile of potential Mastercraft Trainers and workshops that are appropriate locations restricts the pool of relevant workshops that are expected to have the necessary technology/equipment profile, reliable power supply, access to inputs and suppliers, market/display space will be small.

At the workshop level itself, size and physical layout will provide additional limits to instructional outreach opportunities under the informal apprenticeship window. An additional concern is that in some operational locations social frictions between FDP and HC further restricts opportunities for the equitable provision of skills upgrading and on-the-job training sessions. Finally, efforts made by international partners working in faraway locales, may be successful, at the national level, in introducing core referent documents and policy changes aimed at improving formal apprenticeship systems, but in PROSPECTS locations the expected impact from working towards including local artisans, workshops, craftpersons into national systems (including certification) would be expected to be negligible.

As a result, the ILOs PROSPECTS programme seeks to work with local trades and business associations, Chambers of Commerce, and local administrations to jointly develop the community action plan(s) that will identify the trade-based occupational competencies that are recognized by the ILO and its partner local associations for self-employment or wage employment with one of the many informal enterprises in PROSPECTS locations. For the apprentices, that will be engaged under the ILOs informal apprenticeship component, it will mean that significant efforts will also be directed at improving the quality and conditions of the apprenticeship; however, these efforts will focus initially on a small number of marketable trades. 

Preliminary analyses in West Kordofan and East Darfur and extensive analysis in neighbouring North Kordofan and White Nile states, reveal that the incidence of informal apprenticeships is highest in the following three occupations (see Informal Apprenticeship Upgrading Report, ILO, 2019):

• Automotive Repair
• Construction Carpentry
• Metalwork (Welding and Blacksmith)

Objective:

• The Objective of the present assignment is to support the International Labour Organization in the implementation of its “Upgrading Informal Apprenticeship Training System Approach”. This approach will emphasize improving planning, coordination, and outcomes producedby stakeholders involved in the local informal training system in East Darfur (Nimir Camp and Assalayaa Settlement) and West Kordofan (Keilak/Kharasana corridor and El Meiram settlement), while at the same time focus onimproving  the quality and conditions of the apprenticeship training and learning experience at the local workshop level.

Reporting lines

The selected implementing partner will work under the direct supervision of the PROSPECTS team in Khartoum Sudan. This includes regular planning and progress meetings, joint discussions and agreement on best approaches and regular progress reports. TheSkills for Employment Policy Brief on Upgrading Informal Apprenticeship Systems serves as the main guideline for this Terms of Reference.  The selected implementing partner will agree with the PROSPECTS teams on aspects of the methodology that have to be adjusted in the context of Sudan.

Submission of Proposals and Selection Criteria for Shortlist

The interested implementing partner should submit a technical and financial proposal no later than 06 May2021, 4pm [CAT].

The financial proposal is to include a cost breakdown indicating staff and activity costs by deliverable in USD. The financial offer is to exclude the procurement equipment kits, as these will be procured by the ILO based on the results reported under deliverable 4 (equipment needs analysis) and should only indicate the administrative cost of supervising the equipment distribution process at the various target locations. Furthermore, the financial proposal should not include any financial incentives for the beneficiaries for participation in the apprenticeship training scheme.

The technical proposal should lay out, in detail, the comparative advantage of the organization in implementing the aforementioned deliverable and provide a detailed implementation work plan respecting the project end date of June 30 2023. The ILO will not consider incomplete submissions. All responses and supporting documentation received will be treated as strictly confidential and will not be made available for the public.

The selection process shall take into consideration the followings:

1. Demonstrated understanding of the TORs;

2. Institutional capacity to carry out the activities and/or produce the outputs, and manage the funds entrusted to them; including:

• Technical expertise of key project staff.
• Internal logistical infrastructure/ arrangement.

3. Soundness of the proposed work-plan and timeline(s);

4. Proposed project management arrangements ;

5. Proposed reporting framework; and

6. The financial proposal

Both the technical and financial proposals should reflect planning to mitigate against relevant risks.

Note: For organizations without an office in both target states, the proposal should further clarify how they intend to bridge distances between target localities.

All interested organization can send questions to Abdelmonaim Ahmed ahmeda@ilo.org to the ILO until 15April 2021. Questions will be answered and shared with the interested organizations by Close of Business on21April 2021.

PAYMENT SCHEDULE

• 1st payment will be 10% of the total budget and to be disbursed once a detailed inception report is provided.
• 2nd payment will be 50% of the total budget and will be disbursed on completion and submission of deliverables 2-6.
• 3rd payment will be 30% of the budget which is to be disbursed upon satisfactory progress on deliverables 7-13.
• 4th payment of 10% is to be disbursed upon the submission of the final project report.