WEC Background:
The Water, Environment and Climate (WEC) portfolio, based in Vienna, and with offices based globally is part of the UNOPS Global Portfolio Office. The Portfolio has built strong partnerships and is effectively managing a portfolio of over USD 500 million (over the last 15 years) to support key initiatives with fund management, project implementation and administrative support. WEC effectively operationalizes partners' agendas with global approaches, as well as regional and country specific activities focused on climate action, protection and conservation of the environment. Partners profit from WEC’s ability to operationalize and/or scale up their important substantive agendas, including in support of key multilateral environmental and climate agreements, such as the Paris Agreement, the Cartagena Convention as well as the Sustainable Development Goals.
Initiative for Climate Action Transparency:
The Initiative for Climate Action Transparency was established in 2015 at the COP that adopted the Paris Agreement to support implementation of the Agreement’s Enhanced Transparency Framework. The Initiative works with over 50 developing countries ranging from large countries, like Nigeria, to small islands, such as Antigua & Barbuda.
ICAT provides countries with tailored support and practical tools and methodologies to build robust transparency frameworks needed for effective climate action in sync with national development priorities. The projects ICAT supports relate to: building or enhancing transparency frameworks for mitigation; building a monitoring and evaluation approach for adaptation; building or enhancing frameworks to track progress in implementing nationally determined contributions; assessing the impacts of climate policies; estimating or enhancing projections of greenhouse gases; integrating and/or aggregating climate actions at the subnational level and by non-State actors; building a tracking system for just transition processes; establishing or enhancing a climate data system; and putting in place a framework to track climate finance.
To support these areas, ICAT offers a suite of practical, open-source tools and methodologies to provide effective support to the transparency efforts of countries around the world.
ICAT is an unincorporated multi-stakeholder partnership steered by the Donor Steering Committee (DSC), conformed by its donors, Austria; Canada; Germany; Italy; the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF); and ClimateWorks Foundation (CWF), and includes the UNFCCC Secretariat as the dedicated UN body with a climate change policy mandate, and UNOPS as an ex-officio member. The Initiative is managed by UNOPS on behalf of the DSC. Within UNOPS, the ICAT Secretariat manages ICAT day-to-day activities, coordinating and guiding the work of the implementing partners.
In this context, the monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of national adaptation policies and actions is essential as it enables decision-makers to assess whether a policy is on track to achieving its intended goals and whether it is having any unintended consequences. A robust M&E framework allows decision-makers to better manage policies, by providing information that facilitates strategic adjustments to policies and their implementation, with the aim of enhancing their effectiveness and making them more cost-efficient.
ICAT’s focus is to support the use of data for evidence-based policymaking. Within the ICAT toolbox, there are 10 guides to support policy assessment in various sectors agriculture, energy, forestry.) and for a range of cross-cutting topics, including the integration of actions from non-state actors. Policies can be assessed for their effectiveness in terms of meeting GHG emission reduction objectives, their potential to lead to transformational change (or a paradigm shift) and their impacts on socio-economic parameters (or sustainable development impacts). Additionally, the toolbox also includes guides and tools on topics such as article 6, air pollution, adaptation and loss and damage. The toolbox supports countries to better plan their climate policies and measures, implement NDCs, and prepare reports under the Paris Agreement.
As part of an ICAT adaptation project, three guides and one tool on adaptation and loss and damage were developed. The objective of the project was to strengthen the capacity of countries to plan, implement, monitor, and evaluate effective and efficient adaptation actions in a transparent manner. The project also aimed to develop tools and guidance in a bottom-up way, based on country experiences. The project combined methodological work with country support and focused on a limited number of priority areas cutting across aspects of the NDCs of the five partner countries: Bangladesh, Dominican Republic, India, Kenya, and South Africa. Panama was added as a sixth country subsequently.
Based on the work in the adaptation project, the following tool and guides were launched in June 2023:
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Countries have increasingly been approaching ICAT seeking support on M&E for adaptation, where to start and how to approach the work in order to build a strong national M&E framework. Building on the needs identified in the adaptation project above and the demand from countries for more support on adaptation, the ICAT Secretariat seeks the support of a consultant to scope out the approach that ICAT can undertake to more effectively support its partner countries and regions in planning transparency efforts on adaptation.
Objectives
The aim of the consultancy will be to scope out an approach that ICAT can recommend countries to use when planning their transparency efforts on adaptation. This will include identifying what methodological work is required and which tools could add value. The work should result in a systematic, stepwise approach that can be used by countries when they are planning their adaptation transparency efforts and seeking support in developing an M&E framework for adaptation actions. This would also include recommendations on how ICAT can support countries in this process.
All tasks spelled out below shall be conducted in close coordination with and based on instructions by the Secretariat. The deliverables are subject to a review process involving a range of experts and to final endorsement by the Secretariat.
Tasks and Activities
Task 1: Conduct a review of relevant literature and existing work on M&E for adaptation
The first task is to conduct a review of the relevant literature and existing work on the transparency and M&E of adaptation, including country experiences, the ICAT guides and tools mentioned above, relevant scoping reports, training offerings, academic literature, and other methodological work and guidance from organizations such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), the Global Centre on Adaptation, and the NAP Global Network, as well as multilateral development banks. This must also take into account the requirements of the ETF, including voluntary reporting requirements, and other relevant UNFCCC requirements and IPCC guidance, as well as the work and activities of relevant bodies under the UNFCCC such as the Adaptation Committee. Relevant outcomes from COP28 (and other COPs), the Global Stocktake and discussions related to the Global Goal on Adaptation must also be considered.
The review should also consider tools and approaches at the city or subnational level, which could be scaled up for use at the national level. Different forms of approaches should also be explored, as several countries are moving away from a project-based approach to a pathways-driven approach.
The focus of the review is on what is needed for effective policy frameworks and financing of priority adaptation actions. This task may involve interviews or discussions with relevant experts and other stakeholders to identify and map the relevant methodologies, tools and approaches involved in planning and implementing national adaptation M&E activities.
Task 2: Produce a report that provides an overview of the findings from the review in Task 1 and recommendations
The second task is to prepare a report, which should include both an overview of the findings from the review and discussions in Task 1, reflecting on benefits, gaps and limitations, from the existing work related to the transparency and M&E of adaptation, as well as recommendations.
The report should be concise, focused and clear, and include recommendations:
Required experience:
At least seven years of working experience in the area of climate change and environmental management, including at least 5 years with a focus on international climate change cooperation, climate adaptation, and MRV/transparency;
Evidence of in-depth understanding of adaptation policies or actions in developing countries;
Experience in working and collaborating with different stakeholders;
Experience from working with developing countries;
Experience with report writing.
Desired experience:
Experience with support to project coordination and or project management;
Experience with coordinating multiple stakeholders;
Experience working within the UN system.
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