Background:

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) has contracted IFPRI to conduct an endline survey and to analyze data to understand the impacts of the Sustaining Poverty Reduction through Agribusiness Development in South Shaanxi project in Shaanxi Province, China. The project strived to help farmers in remote areas organize production, improve their access to finance, and reach new markets with their products. The data collection is designed as a retrospective impact evaluation including both participants and non-participants, to attempt to understand project impacts against a counterfactual.

The endline survey should take place in communities that participated in the project (the “treatment group”) and similar communities in which the project did not take place (the “control group”).

We seek an organization to conduct the endline survey. The survey should begin as soon as possible, ideally by July 2024. The target sample size is 2000 households, and the final sample size will depend upon calculations we are conducting to understand potential impacts of the project on key outcomes. The survey will include modules on household demographics, agricultural production and practices, livestock holdings, employment, non-farm business, shocks, nutrition and food security, and project participation. We project the survey should take between 90 and 120 minutes to field in most households.

The survey is expected to be conducted in person.

A. The selected organization would be expected to perform the following tasks:

1. Provide comments on the survey developed by the IFPRI team.
2. Translate the English survey into Chinese, and conducted a back translation to check for accuracy.
3. Programming the survey into a CAPI program agreed upon with IFPRI.
4. Assist with obtaining IRB/research ethics approval from a Chinese ethics committee.
5. Test the survey program extensively. Additionally, provide the program to the IFPRI team for testing, and respond to comment provided by the IFPRI team.
6. Develop a training plan to be approved by the IFPRI team.
7. Hire and train enumerator team according to the training plan.
8. Conduct survey piloting prior to or as a part of the training. Allow for survey changes in response to the survey pilot.
9. Develop a logistics plan for survey implementation to be approved by IFPRI.
10. Conduct the survey among target households. Sample list will be developed by IFPRI in conjunction with IFAD and the survey team. IFPRI and IFAD will agree upon the list and the method of targeting households for survey. If households on the list cannot be interviewed, IFPRI team will provide a backup list for those households to be replaced. The goal is 2,000 households completed surveys, more households may be attempted in order to ensure the cleaned data contain at least 2,000 households.
11. Provide regular updates via email during implementation. IFPRI should have access to raw data as it is collected.
12. Audit at least 10% of surveyed households.
13. Conduct data cleaning and provide final data and report of completed survey.

B. Deliverables

1. Translated survey instrument.
2. Programmed survey instrument.
3. Survey training plan.
4. Survey implementation logistics plan.
5. Short report on survey piloting.
6. Regular updates during training and implementation.
7. Raw dataset following survey conclusion.
8. Cleaned baseline dataset.
9. List of households attempted, all attempts to contact, and final outcome.

C. Firm Qualifications

1. The firm must have the ability to collect data in China.
2. The firm must have experience collecting household survey data using electronic data collection, preferably with experience with agricultural households in Shaanxi Province of Vietnam.
3. Experience collecting household surveys for research projects is preferred.

D. Response to TOR

Please send a short proposal that includes plans for undertaking the survey work, an estimated timeline, a proposed budget, and qualifications of the main team members in response to this Terms of Reference.

Application deadline: June 1, 2024