Job title: Procurement and Supply Chain Management (PSM)-Consultant

Location: Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Purpose: To support assessment of the Bottom-Up Quantification

approach for Essential Health Commodities.

Duration: 20 Workdays after signing the contract.

Background 

The USAID Global Health Supply Chain-Technical Assistance-Tanzania (GHSC-TA-TZ) program provides technical assistance to support the development of an agile, robust, and sustainable health supply chain in Tanzania. Strong supply chain systems help ensure product availability and accessibility, and play a critical role in improving the health status of Tanzanians.

Following the findings and recommendations of the holistic supply chain review (HSCR) in 2017, the Ministry of Health, Community Development, Gender, Elderly and Children (MOHCDGEC) in collaboration with PORALG and MSD instituted reforms in quantification systems for essential health commodities. The reforms included the change from the traditional top-down approach (whereby a central level conducts a national forecast on behalf of facilities using data generated by facilities) to the bottom-up approach in forecasting for commodity needs. In the bottom-up approach which was implemented from August 2019, the health facilities conduct their own forecasts while the central level uses individual forecasts to get the national aggregate forecasts and prepare the supply plan to meet the needs identified. The ongoing effort by MOHCDGEC is to fully automate the process leveraging the eLMIS platform.

While vertical programs have continued with the top-down approach, there has been an increasing appetite to adopt the bottom -up approach for vertical program commodities as well. Since the Bottom-up quantification (BUQ) approach brings in accountability and ownership of the forecast by the facilities, it is seen as the go-to solution to eliminate expiries for vertical program items.

A comprehensive assessment is however needed to answer the following questions.

• What is working well in the bottom-up quantification for Essential Health Commodities (EHC)? (Best practices)
• Compared to the EHC quantification guidelines of 2018, what are the gaps in the actual implementation of the approach?
• What can be improved to the current approach for EHC quantification based on gaps observed, innovations made and changing supply chain landscape in Tanzania since 2018?
• What additional considerations (in the technical approach, governance structures and tools etc.) are needed to efficiently adopt the approach for vertical programs quantification?

The outcomes of the assessment will help MOHCDGEC address the gaps in implementation, update the tools (and the guidelines) and make informed decisions on expanding the approach to the vertical programs.

Objectives

To support the MOHCDGEC, conduct an assessment of the bottom-up quantification process for EHC and provide evidence-based recommenda­tions for improving the process and incorporation of vertical program commodities.

Tasks/Activities

• Prepare and submit the study protocol and/or inception report detailing the methodology and techniques to be used in gathering the data/information needed for the assessment of EHC bottom-up quantification process.
• Develop data collection tools to capture the required information.
• Select HF, Councils, Vertical Programs and other key informants to be included in the assessment and provide justification for selection.
• Conduct data collection through virtual platforms or in-person.
• Analyse and synthesize the data/information collected to answer the four research questions of this assessment.
• Provide recommendations for improvement of the current EHC quantification approach, based on findings in (v) above.

• Provide recommendations on additional considerations for expanding the bottom-up approach to vertical program commodities.
• Draft and submit the assessment report to stakeholders for validation.
• Produce a final assessment report with recommendations incorporating stakeholder’s inputs.

Timeframe

• 20 working days after contract signing.

Deliverables

• The study protocol detailing how the assessment will be carried out
• The final assessment report with recommendations
• The power point presentation on assessment key findings and recommendations.
• Document success stories and best practices

Place of Performance

• Dar es Salaam and Dodoma

Knowledge and Experience

Education:

• Masters’ degree in Pharmacy, Pharmacoeconomics, Public Health, Monitoring and Evaluation, Supply Chain Management or related field.
• Bachelor’s degree in Pharmacy is an added value

Experience:

• A minimum of 10 years relevant work experience in providing technical assistance in health supply chain programs both at strategic, tactical and operational levels.
• Experience in working with Pharmaceutical Services Unit, Health Programs, Central PORALG, MSD, Regions and councils in health commodities supply chain related issues.
• Experience in conducting quantification of health commodities in a developing country’s context, preferably quantification of both essential health commodities and vertical program commodities (HIV, Malaria, TB and RCHS).
• Excellent interpersonal, communication, research, analysis and presentation skills

Language Requirement:

• Excellent written and spoken English and Kiswahili

Proposal Submission and Timelines

• All submissions have to be sent to recruitmenttz@gmail.com. Please indicate in subject line “PSM Consultant – BUQ Assessment”.
• Bid submission have to be submitted by November 15, 2021 17:00 EAT.
• All cost proposals should be broken down by daily rate
• The work is expected to start once the contract is signed by the contractor.
• We expect work to commence in December 2021.
• All proposals should be priced/quoted according to days and deliverables.
• All travel costs will be covered by the project and therefore does not have to be included in proposal response
• All proposals should include references and contacts of institutions for which the bidder performed a similar work.
• Examples of past work are required and should be shown when needed.
• Estimated LOE is 20 days
• Duration of activity is from December 2021 to January 2022

Selection Criteria

• Documentation of experience including sample of work and organization for which work was performed.
• References checks.
• Quality of proposal
• Pricing
• The lowest price technical acceptable proposal based on the above criteria will be selected.