Closing date: 15 Mar 2017
Title:
Study Coordinator - Consultancy to coordinate a quantitate research on trafficking, forced labour and children associated with armed forces and groups in three countries
Purpose:
To provide technical leadership and coordination in conducting three probabilistic surveys to estimate the number of victims of trafficking, forced labour and child recruitment, among IDPs in Nigeria, South Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)
Contract type: Short term consultancy
Home based, with frequent travel to the three target countries
Short term consultancy
Contract Duration:
51 work days within a period of four months
Start and End Date:
1 April 2017 to 30 June 2017 (tentative)
Deadline for applications
15th March 2017
Background
Armed conflict has a severe impact on the lives, livelihoods and basic human rights of communities. In conflicts around the world, tens of thousands of children are being recruited and used by armed forces and armed groups. The result of armed conflict crisis can lead to trafficking in persons and exploitation, including labour exploitation and trafficking of both adults and children, combined situations of labour and sexual exploitation and trafficking, forced labour and child labour including its worst forms. At its most damaging, this involves children and adults being trafficked across borders, forced into slavery and recruited and used by armed forces and groups.
The framework of international standards governing the question of forced labour, modern slavery, human trafficking and child labour – including in emergency contexts – enjoys high ratification rates–evidence of a wide consensus that the protection of fundamental rights and the elimination of child labour are high priorities. They include the following.
ILO Minimum Age Convention, 1973 (No. 138) (169 ratifications) calls for members to pursue a national policy designed to ensure the effective abolition of child labour and to raise progressively the minimum age for admission to employment or work consistent with the fullest physical and mental development of young persons (art. 1) and to specify a minimum age for admission to employment (art. 2), hazardous work (art. 3), and light work (art. 7). ILO Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention, 1999 (No. 182) (180 ratifications) calls for immediate and effective measures to be taken to secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labour (art. 1). Those measures shall be applied to all persons, girls and boys, under the age of 18 (art. 2). The worst forms of child labour are defined in article 3. The Recommendation, the non-binding guidelines that accompany ILO Convention No.182 gives some indication as to what work should be prohibited. National law, regulation or decree should provide a list with prohibited forms of hazardous labour. The Optional Protocol to the CRC on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography (173 ratifications) defines the sale of children as ‘any act or transaction whereby a child is transferred by any person or group of persons to another for remuneration or any other consideration’. The Optional Protocol on involvement of children in armed conflict (166 ratifications) prohibits the participation of children under the age of 18 in armed conflict, and governs both voluntary and forced recruitment of minors. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (124 ratifications), adopted in 1998, qualifies the recruitment of children below 15 years for use in armed conflict as a war crime
Security Council Resolution 1612 identifies the recruitment and use of children as one of six grave violations of children’s right and calls for the systematic monitoring and reporting to the council.
ILO Forced labour Convention of 1930 (No. 29) (178 ratifications) calls for the abolishment of forced labour which it defines as "all work or service which is exacted from any person under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not offered himself voluntarily." In addition, ILO Convention 105 (174 ratifications) reports that forced labour can never be used for economic development or as an instrument of political education, discrimination, and discipline through work or as punishment for participating in a strike.
The Palermo protocol (170 ratifications) to ‘Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children’ of 2000 inter alia calls for the prevention, suppression and punishment of all forms of trafficking in of children and broadens the definition of exploitation to include “at a minimum, the exploitation or the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs”.
I*n September 2015, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)* which framed the global development agenda for the next 15 years. One of the seventeen goals (Goal No. 8) calls for the promotion of sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all by 2030. Target 8.7 under this goal states: take immediate and effective measures to eradicate forced labour, end modern slavery and human trafficking and secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labour, including recruitment and use of child soldiers, and by 2025 end child labour in all its form. One of the proposed indicators for target 8.7 is the percentage and numbers of children aged 5-17 years engaged in child labour, per sex and age group (disaggregated by the worst forms of child labour).
Despite this strong international commitment, violations continue. It is a matter of priority and urgency that action must be further strengthened through informed programming to prevent and address violations of fundamental principles and rights, through advocacy and policy dialogue as well as through mechanisms that can hold perpetrators to account. Accurate and up to date information is key to taking such actions effectively. However, at the global level, there continues to be a lack of good information on violations in the context of armed conflict.
In order to address the knowledge gap, in 2016 ILO and UNICEF conducted a joint consultation exercise and commissioned FAFO, an independent research institute to develop suitable methodologies to estimate the number of children associated with armed groups and forces. FAFO conducted extensive consultations and prepared a report concluding that the methodology for each country may vary according its context.
Moving forward from the recommendations of the report, a broader coalition of partners who share similar priorities have joined hands to conduct a pilot study in three countries, that would not only include child soldiers but also trafficking and forced labour. ILO, IOM, UNICEF and Walk Free Foundation (WFF) have agreed to pool technical and financial resources to conduct this study as a pilot that would not only contribute producing to global estimates on child soldiers but will also enhance global understanding on the impact of armed conflict on forced labour and other worst forms of child labour. The pilot will be conducted in three countries: Nigeria, South Sudan and DRC.
Rationale for selecting the three countries for the pilot
The Secretary General’s Report on Children and Armed Conflict identifies Nigeria, South Sudan and DRC as countries where children are recruited and used in armed conflict. On certain occasions they are also used to perpetrate acts of extreme violence such as suicide bombings. Children as well as adults, particularly females in these countries are abducted and trafficked while some are subjected to forced marriage and used for sexual purposes. As such, the three selected countries have a significant caseload of child labour and forced labour that would allow for a substantive analysis.
During periods of armed conflict in Nigeria, South Sudan, and DRC, an absence of the rule of law has often created a state of impunity, where traffickers in certain localities can act without the fear of arrest and condemnation. Trafficking in persons has turned into a means to achieve armed groups’ objectives, such as the recruitment of fighters and workforce, financing of the groups’ activities, providing for sexual services. Trafficking has also been linked to the ethnic and/or religious dimensions of the conflict, where there have been reports of the systematic trafficking and enslavement of ethnic minorities. There can also be a strong gender dimension to trafficking in times of crisis. In Nigeria, for example, Boko Haram has specifically targeted women and girls, with the mass abductions of women and girls in the territories under their control. There are profound links with sexual exploitation and sexual slavery.
Armed conflict in Nigeria, South Sudan and DRC have created high levels of internal displacement. IDPs are considered amongst the most vulnerable populations to fall victim of trafficking and they are considered a target for traffickers. The general lack of economic opportunities and the increasing reliance on negative coping mechanisms can translate, in some cases, into heightened vulnerability to Trafficking among affected populations. Positions of vulnerability may be abused, while traffickers take advantage of the desperate economic and social conditions of the affected population. Furthermore, the negative coping mechanisms that some families and individuals affected by displacement adopt, such as forced early marriages and child labour, may directly result in exploitation and trafficking.
IOM, one of the agencies conducting this survey has extensive IDP databases in the three selected countries. This provides a good basis and a starting point for the survey, particularly in developing the sampling framework. Moreover as the purpose of the study is to pilot a survey model, it is of particular importance that secondary factors such as logistics, local facilitation and data collection capacity do not pose any obstacle. As such selecting countries where one or more of the agencies commissioning this survey have significant presence will be a major contributing factor to successfully implementing it. UNICEF and IOM have sizable programmes and presence in the selected countries while ILO has a country office in Nigeria and has past experience working in child labour, trafficking, forced labour and other programmes in all three countries.
Methodology
As per the study conducted by FAFO, no single methodology will fit all countries and all circumstances. Therefore, a suitable methodology that takes into consideration the local context of the target country should be developed and adopted. In the case of the three selected countries, the IOM maintains an extensive database of displaced persons in each of these countries that includes information on family status, income, and vulnerability and contact details. The database provides a good basis for developing a stratified sample for the pilot study to randomly select respondents who would be interviewed. Data collection will be done by experienced IOM enumerators specially trained for the purpose of this survey, under the guidance of a protocol agreed by the Study Steering Committee (SSC). A two tier questionnaire with the first tier containing initial filter questions and the second tier containing detailed questions on violations (risk of trafficking and child recruitment) will be administered. The data thus collected will be cleaned, entered and analysed and a report will be drafted.
The data so collected may be further enhanced and triangulated through key informant interviews, focus group interviews and where appropriate through statistical data from the Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism on Grave Child Rights Violations.
Upon analysing the data, the draft report will be developed by the consultant (Study Coordinator) and presented to the SSC. The SSC may convene an expert workshop in which the draft report including the findings of the study will be discussed and validated. The final report will be produced incorporating the comments and feedback received at the validation workshop.
The final report should be between 30 and 40 A4 pages excluding annexes, and should be appropriately formatted. Annexes may include the questionnaire, the survey protocol and other relevant documents.
Administration
The survey is conducted jointly by four organisations, ILO, IOM, UNICEF and WFF. A Study Steering Committee (SSC) comprising specialists from each of the organisations will make overall decisions regarding the survey. Each agency will contribute through funds and technical expertise. On behalf of the SSC, ILO will recruit and provide direct supervision to the Study Coordinator. However on a regular basis, the Study Coordinator will interact closely with all the members of the SSC, who will also serve as link persons between the Study Coordinator and the respective agencies.
IOM teams in the three countries will carry out the collection, cleaning and entering of the data. Each country team will be led by a National Survey Coordinator who has adequate knowledge and experience for the task. The Study Coordinator will coordinate the work of the three National Survey Coordinators to ensure the smooth implementation of the survey, in close collaboration with the SSC. Members of the SSC will provide technical inputs and may also participate in technical tasks such as developing and finalising the questionnaire, analysing the data and contributing to the final report.
Overall Tasks and Responsibilities
The Study Coordinator will be overall responsible for the timely completion of the survey and the finalisation of the survey report. He/she will take over from the point up to which the SSC has undertaken activities and see to the completion of the survey. The main tasks and deliverables of the Study Coordinator are listed in the table below.
Tasks (please see attachment for details)
- Finalise the Survey questionnaire
- Develop the survey protocol
- Localise Pre-test and finalise the questionnaire
- Train IOM enumerators
- Oversee data collection
- Oversee data cleaning
- Oversee data entry
- Analyse data, draft survey report and share with SSC
- Plan validation workshop,
- Present draft report at validation workshop
- Finalise the survey report
Time frame/Key milestones
· Questionnaire and survey protocol finalised by 15th April
· Data collection completed by 31st May
· Data entry and analysis concluded by 15th June
· Draft report shared by 30th June
· Validation workshop conducted by 10th July
· Final report and estimates produced by 15th July
Payment
First instalment of 30% of the fees upon satisfactory completion of tasks 1 to 4.
Second instalment of 20% of the fees upon satisfactory completion of tasks 4 to 5.
Third and final installment of 50% upon satisfactory completion of all other remaining tasks.
In addition, the consultant will be paid DSA according to standard UN rates for travel undertaken for the assignment.
Required qualifications
· Advanced university degree (Masters or above) in statistics, social sciences, human rights, conflict studies or a related field.
· At least 10 years relevant experience including in conducting surveys in conflict settings and among vulnerable populations..
· Very good knowledge of conflict dynamics, human rights monitoring, protection monitoring.
· Very good knowledge of surveys, qualitative and quantitative research and analysis
· Sound analytical and writing skills and proven ability to write concise, informative, and accurate reports in understandable terms.
· Able to work under time-pressure and deliver work of outstanding quality.
· Fluency and a high level of competency in English is a must. A working knowledge of French will be highly advantageous.
Please refer to the link below for the full Terms of Reference.
How to apply:
How to apply
Interested candidates should send a brief covering note explaining their suitability for this assignment and indicating their expected daily fee, together with their Curriculum Vitae/resume on or before the 15th of March 2017 to the following email address: FUNDAMENTALS@ilo.org with the subject line titled: Pilot Study Consultancy.
To download the full ToR please click:
http://www.ilo.org/ipecinfo/product/download.do?type=document&id=29015