Deadline: 17-Apr-22
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Feed the Future Agriculture and Food-Systems Development Activity (AFDA) is inviting proposals for Women Entrepreneurship Partnership Program in Myanmar.
AFDA is seeking one or more partners that have technical skills and experiences with innovative, evidence-based, sustainable and commercially viable business models and concepts to address the aforementioned challenges that women entrepreneurs in Myanmar.
AFDA will identify existing and potential market opportunities, incentivize firms to invest in their operations and supply chains, while pulling smallholder farmers and rural participants, many in ethnically divided areas, into expanded markets.
AFDA will facilitate systemic change by using adaptive management and stakeholder-led processes to facilitate improved conditions and incentives for markets to work better for poor and marginalized populations. This will result in strengthened market linkages and improved service provision, input supply, and post-harvest value addition to meet market demand in a conflictsensitive manner.
Purpose
- AFDA’s gender analysis findings as well as secondary data and reports on women’s entrepreneurship in Myanmar1 reveal the low levels of women business owners compared to male business owners and far greater barriers to establishing and growing their businesses for women as compared to their male counterparts.
Outcomes
(AFDA) will facilitate the transformation of agriculture and food systems by increasing productivity, inclusiveness, and competitiveness of key sectors in the Zone of Influence: Shan, Kachin, Mandalay, Sagaing, and Magway. It has four intended outcomes:
- Outcome 1: Increased economic interdependence among market actors of different ethnic backgrounds
- Outcome 2: Increased access to agricultural support services
- Outcome 3: Increased availability of improved inputs
- Outcome 4: Smallholder supply chains expand domestic and international market access
Deliverables
- Select/recruit about 75 new and existing women entrepreneurs from AFDA’s ZOI using selection criteria jointly developed with AFDA. (Minimum number can be negotiable.) Develop assessment tool, conduct initial assessment of selected participants and submit assessment report and workplan for executing the deliverables for AFDA’s review.
- Develop new and/or modify existing entrepreneurship curriculum with AFDA’s Technical Specialist.
- Train, mentor and coach selected entrepreneurs/participants and guide them to develop participants’ individual strategic business designs/plans.
- Advocate and supervise participant entrepreneurs to develop business proposals to be ready for AFDA’s review/evaluation.
- Organize engagement between entrepreneurs and potential stakeholders for access to finance and resources for business implementation.
- Provide interval Progress Reports (minimum twice) and Final Report to AFDA with presentation to SMT.
Eligibility Criteria
- Have interest in promoting women economic empowerment in agriculture through women entrepreneurship intervention.
- Possess ability to generate resources and willingness to develop and implement innovative approaches towards women inclusion in agriculture targeting AFDA’s ZOI.
- Relevant track record and successful experience (Minimum five years – can be relaxed if extensive experience and evidence of strong success is presented.) in entrepreneurship, particularly capacity building, business development service provision for entrepreneurs and MSMEs, and/or developing business incubators/accelerators focused on women entrepreneurs within the Myanmar agricultural sector.
- Possess technical experience in training, mentoring and coaching smallholder women and women entrepreneurs in agriculture.
- A good understanding and demonstrated experience of facilitating market linkages between women entrepreneurs and other market systems actors in Myanmar highly preferred.
- Experience of working with ethnic minority population in diverse communities.
- Applicants should be registered in Myanmar; foreign organizations may apply provided the project is carried out in Myanmar (within AFDA ZOI) and that they possess appropriate license for operating in Myanmar.
- Those affiliated with political parties, groupings, or institutions or their subsidiaries and affiliates will be ineligible.
- Those promoting anti-democratic policies or illegal activities will be ineligible.
For more information, visit https://bit.ly/3DODIK9