UNDP Call for Proposals for ‘Creating Awareness and Access to Social Protection in India’

Deadline: 8 June 2020

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is inviting proposals for ‘Creating awareness and access to social protection in 5 selected districts of Madhya Pradesh’. The project will focus on delivery and access of social protection schemes in the wake of COVID-19 outbreak to poor and vulnerable households in the identified districts and blocks in Madhya Pradesh, mainly:

• Technical support to accelerate opening of public works through MGNREGA and expand registration of eligible households in vulnerable communities to access job cards and immediate employment opportunities.
• Identify vulnerable individuals and households to facilitate access to social support and entitlements in priority rural areas, and facilitate linkages with the respective government administrative departments, through partnerships with CSOs and voluntary networks.
• Capacity building of frontline functionaries and civil society organisations responding to the pandemic.

Objectives

Objective 1 – Strengthening community access to Social Protection benefits

• Providing linkages to Social Protection schemes and programmes
   The uptake of social protection would be critical in the COVID crisis as numerous workers have been rendered jobless due to the lockdown and shutting down of labour intensive sectors. Further, the other marginalized groups such as scheduled tribes and scheduled castes – who have become highly vulnerable and are at the highest risk of falling back into poverty – are required to be brought into the social protection fold.
• Creating cadre of ‘Community Mobilisers’
  To mobilize, inform and facilitate registration of individuals/households to access social protection schemes including the COVID-19 welfare package. Working in partnership with CSOs, youth of the community who are above 18 years of age will be trained as social advocates to help the communities in taking precautionary measures, respect for social distance, personal hygiene and raise awareness among them about their entitlements.

Objective 2 – Strengthening Governance Institutions to deliver social protection and implementation of preventative measures for COVID-19 response

• Capacity Building of frontline workers: The role of ICDS workers, ASHAs, Panchayat (PRI) Secretaries, Ward members, Sarpanchs are critical for prevention and ensuring delivery of entitlement to the vulnerable communities.
• Support to the Panchayati Raj Institutions and local administration: Capacities of the PRI institutions in the identified geographies will be built to analyze the trend of pandemic spread in a specific area and develop readiness plans (at incremental levels) for infection prevention and quarantine facilities preparedness at Gram Panchayat level.
• Strengthening decentralized governance structures to link communities with social protection benefits with focus on MGNERGA: Coordinate and support local administration especially the Gram Panchayat and the Block in accelerating the opening and uptake of MGNREGA works with proper preventive measures. Specific focus will be given for uptake of works by the most vulnerable groups like migrants household, women headed households, SC/STs, etc.

Key Tasks

• Creating a community cadre at the block level, with district level monitoring mechanism, to engage with the influx of migrant workers and other vulnerable households in the identified blocks/districts. The cadre will engage with PRIs and gram panchayats to mobilise, inform and facilitate registration of migrants and vulnerable households to access social protection schemes and programmes of the central and state government including Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana as well as health safety measures.
• Spreading awareness of the various social protection schemes & COVID-19 relief package and increasing the accessibility by providing support or facilitation in linking beneficiaries with the local administration.
• Building capacities and supporting the frontline workers and PRI functionaries (sarpanch, ward members, rozgar sahayaks, panchayat secretary etc.) for effective COIVD response.
• Technical support to local administration especially the Gram Panchayat and the Block in accelerating the opening of MGNREGA works with proper preventive measures and, increase uptake of work, especially by the most vulnerable group like migrant households, women headed households, SC/STs, etc. In conjunction with district administration, provide authentic and right kind of information about the decisions of the state government and local administration on implementation of MGNREA
• Create awareness on social distancing and other preventive measures for COVID 19 among the various target groups (migrant households, vulnerable household and other potential population, front line workers of line departments like ASHAs and ANMs, Agriculture Mitra etc.). All the awareness generation activities will integrate the issues of stigma and will be gender sensitive.

Expected Outcomes

• Create a cadre of 50 community mobilisers at block level with capacities to support PRI functionaries on effective COVID-19 response.
• Atleast 80,000 beneficiaries reached with information on social protection schemes of the Centre and State Governments amongst in the defined geographies.
• Facilitate linking of rural households to social protection schemes (BOCW, Social Protection benefits and MGNREGA) by assisting filling of applications and supporting PRIs & GPs to facilitate registrations.
• 25,000 beneficiaries are linked with atleast one of the social protection benefits.
• Build capacities of 2000 PRI functionaries and other front line functionaries around COVID measures (Sapranches, Ward Members, ASHAs, ANMs, Panchayat Secretary, Rozgaar sahayaks) to respond to COVID crisis.
• Liase with District and Block administration to facilitate linkage of social protection schemes for the vulnerable households.

Eligibility Criteria

• Service Provider should have at least 7 years of experience on working on rural development for poor and vulnerable communities in Madhya Pradesh;
• Service Provider should have at least 5 experience of experience of working on rights and entitlements for poor and vulnerable communities;
• Service Provider should have implemented at least 2 project with linkage with MGNERGA.

For more information, visit https://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=66466