Request for Expressions of Interest for consultancy service to support the Environmental and Social Safeguards

TRVC overall aims to bring about significant positive environmental and social outcomes by incentivising the scaling of low-carbon sustainable and climate resilient rice production so doing the programme aims to deliver climate adaptation and mitigation benefits through the widespread adoption of AWD (Alternate Wetting and Drying) and other approaches/ technologies that reduce the use of agro-inputs and water in the production of rice. These more sustainable production practices also offer other environmental benefits such as reduced pollution of waterways and associated benefits for biological diversity. From a social perspective the programme has a very specific emphasis on ensuring that smallholders and local farming communities (including ethnic minority peoples) participate in and benefit from the rice value chain transformations. Thus ultimately the programmes interventions should serve to increase rice yields and net profits of rice farmers.

However certain risks remain due to the nature of the activities (large scale rice production) and inherent risks with agribusinesses in the sector (e.g. related to labour and working conditions of employees and supply chain workers Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)/ Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) use of agro-chemicals etc). Moreover the precautionary principle is applied e.g. as ethnic minority farmers will also be involved in the supply chains in the programs target areas.

TRVC has prepared an Environmental and Social Management Framework (ESMF). It provides a set of procedures actions and measures for the avoidance management/minimisation and mitigation in response to the identified risks. These include:

• Environmental and social due diligence checks to be performed on participating companies by SNV including triangulation with local communities and other local stakeholders to eliminate companies with a bad record in terms of honouring contracts treatment of employees and other cases of poor environmental and social performance.
• Exclusion Checklist (e.g. including use of banned/listed agro-chemicals).
• Screening and assessment of companies proposed competition approaches and technologies and existing ESMS leading to the elaboration of a basic Environmental and Social Action Plan (ESAP) for each competitor to be implemented by the competitor.
• Development of an Ethnic Minority Policy Framework (EMPF) for situations where ethnic minorities are affected by or involved in the program. This should be a simple document providing guidance on adequate free prior and informed consent (FPIC) consultation with ethnic communities/households engagement in the programme in a culturally appropriate manner provision of recourse to a grievance redress mechanism and other measures that can be incorporated into ESAPs and associated monitoring.
• Pre-competitive capacity building on the IFC Performance Standards and basic safeguards requirements for companies participating in the prize competition e.g. regarding stakeholder engagement/ consultation with communities; fair contracts; PPE to be provided; Trainings to be provided (e.g. on OHS IPM) and in what form including women and ethnic minority farmers etc.
• Monitoring and reporting of ESAP implementation by companies and annual check by reality many companies will be required to implement certain standards for their certification standards.

SNV will perform checking and ensuring the implementation of the relevant safeguards by the companies regularly throughout the programme by checking reports submitted by companies and conducting spot checks. As competition manager SNV will also establish and make programme stakeholders including participating farmers aware of a programme-based GRM for the receipt and address of complaints and grievances.

In responding to the mentioned assignment SNV is seeking to engage a qualified national consultant to support the TRVC projects Environmental and Social Safeguards to ensure its compliance with existing DFATs requirements and standards in harmony with SNV and existing regulations of Viet Nam Government.

Reporting and coordination structure:

The Consultant will work under overall supervision of the Agrifood Sector Lead and the direct supervision of the TRVC Team Leader and in close coordination with the Project Coordinator as a Safeguards focal person and team.

Key assignments include:

1. Provide technical support to participating companies to achieve identified environmental and social safeguards outcomes following the set of procedures actions and measures for the avoidance management/minimisation and mitigation in response to the identified risks (i.e. conduct screening and assessment of companies; support to develop ESAPs track their implementation with timely advice);
2. Provide trainings on environmental and social safeguards to TRVC project stakeholders including participating companies government partners farmers with updated relevant safeguards policies from DFAT/SNV and IFC.
3. Produce the bi-annual annual and ad-hoc reports on environmental and social safeguards following the standard and requirements of DFAT and SNV; and documenting learning and case study for publication.
4. Support and participate in meetings with DFAT experts and assessment teams.

The selected Consultants will enter a Framework Agreement for Professional Service (the Agreement) with SNV with expected timeframe from January 2026 December 2027 covering the listed technical support areas. Based on the signed Agreement the detailed tasks with allocated working days and timeline will be discussed and agreed under Tasks Orders for each mobilization period signed by the consultant and SNV authorized representative.

Qualifications :

Educational background:

o Masters or above degrees in environmental/social sciences development studies or related field

Professional experiences: 

o At least 7 years experience with the design preparation and/or implementation of donor-funded projects and associated environmental and social safeguards requirements; related experience in the agriculture/environment sector in Viet Nam is a plus.

o At least 3 years of experience working with private sector partners.

o Familiarity with knowledge of and experience with the agriculture sector and especially rice sector is highly desirable

o Native Vietnamese language speaker with proficient capability to write present and communicate in English.

Others:

o Strong training facilitation and presentation skills

o Excellent written and verbal communication skills with proven ability to prepare clear and concise reports for donors and stakeholders

o High attention to detail and ability to work independently with limited supervision

o Demonstrated experience in coordinating with multiple partners and delivering outputs within tight timelines.

Abilities to travel to Mekong Delta provinces when required.

Submission instructions:

Interested individual consultants should submit the Letter of Interest via the instructions in this site with the following information:

Signed Letter of Interest includes the followings:

Attachment 1: CVs of individual consultants and proposed gross day rate
Attachment 2: Degrees and certificates
Attachment 3: Scanned copies of the identity cards of individual consultants.

Attachment 4: Due Diligence document click  5: At least two (02) samples of their authored environment and social safeguards products and/or report to donor

EOIs are accepted until 17.00 p.m December 17th 2025 (Vietnam time).

All questions regarding this call should be sent to  

Additional Information :

Selection process

SNV will review all EOIs received in accordance with the guidelines and criteria in this solicitation. SNV reserves the right to exclude any EOIs that do not meet the guidelines. Please note that SNV is unable to provide detailed feedback to those EOIs that are not selected.

Step 1: SNV will shortlist selected EOIs. Successful applicants will be contacted by SNV for Framework Agreement for Consultancy Services or informed to keep on our consultant roster for two years.

Step 2: SNV will release Task Orders for the specific activities with the selected consultants based on the Framework Agreements signed accordingly.

Remote Work :

No

Employment Type :

Part-time