IFPRI is looking for an organization to conduct a quantitative study to collect baseline household quantitative data on evaluating the impact of digital tool integration on agricultural outcomes, youth employment, and gender inequality in Kenya's Potato Value Chain. 

Objective

This quantitative research study is intended to provide a baseline for the Mastercard Foundation project on evaluating the impact of digital tool integration on agricultural outcomes, youth employment, and gender inequality in Kenya's potato value chain. As such, the implementer will conduct a household survey to understand current economic status, agricultural practices including digital tool adoption, labor practices, food consumption, and dietary diversity, as well as gender and youth differences in these areas. consultancy is to coordinate and conduct a face-to-face quantitative survey among farming households in two counties in Kenya (Nakuru and Nyandarua). The quantitative survey will consist of in-person interviews with men and women farmers (lasting 90-120 minutes), conducted via computer-assisted personal interviewing (CAPI), with about 1,500 households, and all data will be collected by November 30, 2024. IFPRI will be solely responsible for the design of the quantitative survey instrument and the selection of exact study locations. The work will be implemented in close collaboration with the Farm to Market Alliance (FtMA) Kenya country coordination team.

Deliverables

• Translate the survey instrument and interview guide into local languages (as needed).
• Obtain ethics clearance, research permits, and/or other local approvals
• Obtain enough tablets for CAPI data collection.
• Develop, test, and finalize the CAPI data entry program that will be used to conduct the interviews in the field.
• With assistance from the IFPRI, prepare the field implementation manual prior to enumerator training. The field manual will be the basis for quality assurance of the data collection process.
• Organize the selection, hiring, and payment of enumerators to conduct the required data collection work. This will include hiring both male and female interviewers with the necessary language skills to ensure respondents for the individual interviews are matched on sex.
• Facilitate and ensure the smooth operation of the enumerator training and survey pretest in collaboration with IFPRI staff. IFPRI and the selected firm will jointly consider the COVID-19 implications of whether IFPRI staff conducting the training will do so in-person or virtually. It is expected that there will be a 5-day training, followed by a 2-day pretest and debrief, for the quantitative survey.
• Develop a field schedule for the quantitative data collection teams and provide regular status updates during fieldwork.
• Develop spot- and back-check protocols and share these with IFPRI for feedback prior to the start of data collection.
• Participate in weekly meetings with IFPRI throughout data collection.
• Share the data generated from the spot and back-checks and additional data collection concerns with IFPRI in a timely manner so that issues can be promptly resolved.
• Share the data generated from CAPI (in Stata format) with IFPRI during data collection, as and when the data is uploaded to the servers. These data will not be the cleaned data sets (except for variable and value labels, checking and correcting skip patterns, and formatting the data in long format as required), but the raw data sets as sent to the firm from their survey teams.
• Conduct data cleaning to ensure consistency and range-checks; share the error check do-files with IFPRI.
• Provide responses to queries from IFPRI in relation to data cleaning (as needed).
• Deliver cleaned data sets (in Stata format) from the 1,500 households in long format. The dataset should include translation of any open-ended questions from local languages to English if necessary.
• Provide a brief report covering quantitative survey fieldwork, as well as any issues related to data management and cleaning.

Research Questions:

1. How does the intensity of digital tools training impact the adoption of digital tools and literacy among Farmer Service Centers (FSCs), and what are the resulting changes in their capacity to support farmers effectively?
2. What are the measurable effects of digitally empowered FSCs on post-harvest management, crop yields, product quality, access to information and services for women farmers and, ultimately, socioeconomic outcomes such as increased income, job creation, and enhanced livelihoods within agricultural communities?

Required Qualifications

• Demonstrated experience conducting quantitative survey fieldwork in Kenya within the past 5 years.
• Demonstrated experience conducting survey-related training.
• Expert knowledge of local context and languages in the target areas.
• Experience in building trust and good relations with village leaders, interviewees, and communities.
• Strong program management skills.
• Demonstrated experience in successfully coordinating large field teams and managing deliverables.
• Excellent computer skills and experience using CAPI and statistical software packages.
• Demonstrated experience with obtaining appropriate local ethics review and permits.
• Familiarity with digital tools used in agriculture and their impact on farming practices.
• Understanding of youth employment and gender dynamics in the agricultural sector.

Application Instructions

Please upload a proposal outlining the approach, human resources, timing, and costs (including details of staff time, training of trainers, field data collection, overhead, etc.), along with CV/resume (including details of previous related experience) for individual(s) leading the work. We expect that the applicant will be a local survey firm able to handle a contract with IFPRI and source the required human resources to fulfil the scope of the work themselves.

**This requisition is only open to firms. Interested firms must submit/upload a cost-proposal with the application. **

**We are unable to respond to every applicant individually; only selected applicants will be contacted. **