Background

In Liberia, the main vector control strategy against malaria, one of the main causes of morbidity and mortality, is increasing access to and use of ITNs. To this end, the population has continued to benefit from ITN mass campaigns. The Liberia National Malaria Control Program (NMCP) will organize an ITN mass campaign in 2024. This campaign will be funded by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM).

Planning for the 2024 campaign began early and plans and budgets developed to guide the strategy and operations for the campaign have addressed the recommendations issuing from the local fund agent (LFA) spot checks, as well as reports from national and international partners who were involved in the planning and implementation of the 2021 campaign. The 2024 campaign will be a single-product campaign, with the same type of ITN (Interceptor G2) distributed as per the 2021 campaign and in line with insecticide resistance profiles within the country. The NMCP and partners are currently finalizing the macroplanning package with ITN distribution planned for April/May 2024.

General objective

This consultancy will aim to support the Liberia NMCP with the finalization of all documents and tools to be utilized for each phase of the ITN mass campaign in Liberia (microplanning, trainings and implementation) to ensure timely availability of materials prior to training and implementation, as well as to provide remote and face-to-face strategy/operations and M&E technical assistance for the microplanning and implementation of the ITN mass campaign in Liberia.

Specifically, the consultant will support with the following tasks:

Finalization of documents required for microplanning –7 days (distance support)

• Finalization of the macroplanning packages to incorporate partners’ inputs on the various documents
• Support the finalization of the microplanning templates and materials for training and implementation
• Support the finalization of the data collection and compilation tools for all campaign actors for household registration (HHR) and ITN distribution
• Support the finalization of the tools for supervision and monitoring (including inputs from other sub-committees)
• Support the finalization of the protocol for monitoring HHR and tools for implementation of rapid data collection
• Support the finalization of the protocol for post-distribution assessment of ITN coverage
• Support the finalization of the agendas for training at all levels
• Support the finalization of the standard operating procedures for all campaign actors and for all phases of activity (HHR, distribution, post-distribution)
• Support the finalization of the reporting templates for all activities

Microplanning – 26 days (mixed distance and in country)

• Support the training of facilitators for microplanning, including team building of the national facilitators
• Support the microplanning workshops (as applicable)
• Support the cleaning, review and consolidation of microplans
• Support validation of microplanning data (research options for data validation)
• Support the development of the microplanning report including challenges and lessons learned

Training and support during implementation of the pilot phase of the digitalization – 25 days (mixed distance and in country)

• Support finalization of the entire training package (agendas, training guidelines, SOPs, practical exercises, group work, etc.) for all cadres and all levels (based on drafts for validation from distance support) with the members of all of the different sub-committees
• Support the national facilitators with the organization of the training and its preparation (technical, logistics, administration) to ensure a conducive training environment
• Support the training of trainers through capacity building of the national facilitators
• Support the step down trainings through monitoring and feedback to the national and sub-national facilitators
• Support national monitors with their tasks, build capacity and provide daily observations in the review meetings for programmatic improvements
• Support validation of data from household registration and ITN distribution (research options for data validation where needed)
• Support implementation of the independent monitoring protocol and use of data generated for decision-making

Required qualification of the candidate

We are hiring an international consultant for undertaking this ToR.

Education

• Bachelor’s Degree, preferably in public health or social science.

Experience

• Minimum 5-years of experience with National Malaria Control Programmes
• A minimum of 10 years of experience in at least one of the core ITN mass distribution campaigns, mass vaccination campaigns, or other large-scale health commodity delivery operations areas:
• 10 years’ experience in logistics and supply in relation with health interventions
• Work experience with the digitalization of health care systems
• Work experience at field / operational level