ICRW - Endline research for career & life skills program among Village Saving and Loan community members of SreAmbel district and Koh Kong province - 2017

Project Description:

ICRW served as an evaluation partner and strategic advisor for P.A.C.E. (Personal Advancement and Career Enhancement) a financial and life skills program that had been operational among female garment workers in factories. The program was now complete and had offered 254 female and 6 men from about 11 VSLA’s education and life skills training. The mission’s main objective was to conduct interviewer-administered quantitative surveys and qualitative in-depth interviews to obtain endline information on participant characteristics as well as knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding key learning’s and objectives of the program.

In this context, the mission designed quantitative and qualitative data collection approaches; selected and recruited investigators for data collection; trained investigators and led data collection missions; recorded clean versions of the data; analysed and interpreted results in a final report submitted to ICRW.

LIFT - Interim Review of LIFT 2015-2018 Strategy - 2017

Project Description:

LIFT is a multi-donor fund designed to address the food insecurity and income poverty of poor and vulnerable people in Myanmar. In light of Myanmar’s political, social and economic transformation, LIFT developed a new strategy in 2014 supporting the transformation of Myanmar’s rural economy by promoting inclusive growth and providing new knowledge, technologies and access to finance and markets with more opportunities for agribusiness with the private sector.

MKE’s role was to review LIFT’s strategy in order to improve LIFT’s performance and governance, and to inform future possible funding mechanisms beyond 2018. This required reviewing key documents relating to LIFT’s strategy including specific project documents, such as project proposals, MEAL plans, and project reports, were made available for the review team. MKE also conducted meetings with key Fund Board members, FMO staff, and other stakeholders. The team visited all four agro-ecological target areas to review project progress. Finally MKE produced a final report highlighting key findings with regards to the performance of LIFT, and providing recommendations for future funding strategies.

International Finance Company (IFC) & a Private Client - Ecosystem Service Assessment - 2017

Description of Project:

Around 70.2 ha land in a hilly area of a commune (of one province in Vietnam) was acquired for the Client to develop a Solar Power Project. The Client, being a client of IFC, was required to manage the environmental and social risks associated with the project as per IFC’s sustainability framework. This assessment focused on the applicability of PS6 ‘Biodiversity conservation and sustainable management of living natural resources’ and PS7 ‘Indigenous Peoples’. It was estimated that a number of households (HHs) were economically displaced by the Project, which were compensated by the Client during the land acquisition and compensation process. Besides, an additional number of HHs from nearby hamlets accessed the Project site and adjacent areas for grazing livestock and fuelwood collection. The study strived to assess, considering IFC’s Sustainability framework, the ecosystem services provided by the area containing and surrounding the project site by: determining the impact of the loss of ecosystem services on local HHs living adjacent to the land acquired for the project; and subsequently identifying sustainable alternative livelihood services to replace the lost services.

The following tasks were undertaken:

• Reviewed the Project’s Environmental and Social Impact Assessment for relevant background information on the Project scope and impacts on its area of influence;

• Developed a representative sample of Jrai and Kinh households. Using this representative sample, survey household patterns of use/dependence on livestock grazing, fuel-wood collection and other services at the Project site and other common, resource areas surrounding the project site.

• Undertook a rapid ecosystem services assessment within the Project site based on the social impact

European Commission/Cardno Emerging Markets Ltd - Final Evaluation of the Environmentally and Socially Responsible Tourism Capacity Development Programme -2016

Project Description:

The mission is the final evaluation of the EC-funded Environmentally and Socially Responsible Tourism Capacity Development Programme (ESRT Programme in Vietnam). The overall project objective was: "To mainstream responsible tourism principles into Vietnam’s tourism sector to enhance competitiveness and contributing to achieving the Socio Economic Development Plan (SEDP)."

The programme worked in three key component areas:

(1) Policy Support and Institutional Strengthening

(2) Product Competitiveness and Public-Private Dialogue

(3) Vocational Training and Education.

The main objective of the Final Evaluation was to review project progress, to check results against targets, and to provide a clear and concise opinion and assessment whether the progamme has met its objectives. In this respect the mission assessed the relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, impact and sustainability of the ESRT programme related to its stated purpose and expected results, in accordance with EC evaluation guidelines. By identifying weaknesses and challenges, the evaluation helped the European Commission Delegation and the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism to assess the impact of the programme as well as consider lessons learnt.

World Concern - Nutrition Causal Analysis - Improved economic and nutritional outcome of poor rural people in Norther Kayin State - 2016

Project Description:

A Nutrition Causal Analysis (NCA) was one of the activities planned during the inception phase of CDN’s LIFT-funded rural livelihoods project. The NCA included a quantitative and qualitative methodology. The quantitative data for the NCA was collected from household interviews (400 households).

MKE reviewed and finalized the quantitative questionnaire and FGD questionnaire, and uploaded it into Kobo Toolbox, translated the qualitative and quantitative questionnaire into Burmese, and contributed in the design of a high quality study (qualitative and quantitative) in coordination with World Concern Myanmar. Further, MKE conducted the pilot testing and finalized the qualitative and quantitative questionnaire; then cleaned the quantitative and qualitative data and produced high quality data available for analysis. The final stage of the project involved the writing of a report based off of the findings from both qualitative and quantitative analyses. This report included a list of recommendations for the implementation of the project.

UNDP - Assessment, Identification and Monitoring of Small-scale Water Infrastructure Needs for Drinking & Irrigation Water in the DryZone of Myanmar - 2016

Project Description:

The project aimed to reduce the increasing impacts of climate change on agricultural and livestock production cycles in the dry zone of Myanmar, particularly the impacts of increasing temperature and evaporation, declining water availability, and intensifying weather events especially flash floods and cyclones.

MKE took responsibility for writing the work plan, organizing township level coordination meetings, including preparing all necessary invitations, administration, logistics, and setting the agenda. MKE also managed and led the coordination meetings to varying degrees, based on results of Township level coordination meetings, realized field verification and consultation with the communities by village meetings and a rapid need assessment (RNA).

Further, MKE assisted in the preparation, translation and capitalization of the results to inform the choice of target villages, organized village level consultation meetings, and Water User Groups (WUG). 

Carbon Trust - Scoping study for a low carbon energy security programme in Southeast Asia - 2016

Project Description:

This Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) funded project aimed at promoting low carbon economies by working with governments and organisations in the UK and internationally to reduce carbon emissions. It also aimed to promote the efficient and cost effective management of energy, water and resources, and enable the development of commercial low carbon technologies.

MKE carried out research activities and worked closely with stakeholders to collect and input data as identified in the Excel template sheet provided by the Carbon Trust. MKE carried out initial qualitative research covered by the main policies relevant to renewable energy, energy efficiency, and liquefied natural gas. MKE also conducted a stakeholder mapping exercise according to an influence-interest matrix. MKE’s team facilitated discussions with local stakeholders, including government representatives, parliamentarians and multilateral and bilateral donors and NGOs.

Care Myanmar - Baseline Assessment for Comprehensive rural households food security programme - 2016

Project Description:

The project was aimed to assist approximately 21,000 persons living in over 3,900 households across 32 target villages in Rathedaung township to develop sustainable livelihoods; meaning that they would become food secure and have higher incomes, be more resilient to economic shocks and natural disaster, and be better able to manage intra-communal tensions that presently hold back community development.

MKE conducted quantitative household survey and qualitative focus group discussions to produce below outcomes

1. Increased sources and level of income of target households;

2. Increased capacity of target communities to manage forests, water resources and preparation for/response to disasters;

3. Improved conditions for sustained livelihoods through increased social cohesion between and within communities.

BTC - Baseline Survey and Socio Economic Study for the Project “Integrated water management & urban development for climate change in Ninh Thuan province” - 2016

Project Description:

To collect Baseline data and to conduct the Socio-Economic Survey in 11 communes/wards of 05 districts and cities around Dinh River. It provided quantitative and qualitative information on socio-economic status of households within the projected region; information on knowledge, skill, attitude and concern of residents towards climate change, environment and how to respond with natural disaster.

The survey also assessed capability of the local authorities in managing water resources, forecasting and responding to floods and storms and conducting urban planning in connection with climate change and identifies their demands in order to improve their capability for the project’s priorities.

Mercy Corps - Baseline Survey of Linking Laputta to Markets(LLM)- LIFT Delta 3 - 2016

Project Description:

The aim of the Baseline survey of Linking Laputta to Markets (LLM) was ‘increased incomes for landless, vulnerable and smallholder households in Laputta Township’. Two higher-level outcomes (HLOs) will contribute to this goal: Total projected beneficiaries for the LLM project is 5,100 HHs from 276 villages.

MKE took responsibility to produce outcomes: HLO 1: Improved performance of smallholder farmers in the rice value chain; HLO 2: Landless and vulnerable women and men have stability of income from diverse off-farm employment and economic opportunities. Intermediate outcomes include

a) farmer producer enterprises (FPEs) operating as professional market actors

b) smallholder farmers adopting improved agricultural practices

c) landless women and men benefitting from improved employment opportunities.