1.0 Background

The AECF is a leading development organization that supports innovative enterprises in the agribusiness and renewable energy sectors with the aim of reducing rural poverty, promoting climate-resilient communities, and creating jobs.

We catalyze the private sector by surfacing and commercializing new ideas, business models, and technologies designed to increase agricultural productivity, improve farmer incomes, expand clean energy access, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and improve resilience to the effects of climate change. We finance high-risk businesses that struggle to access commercial funding; we are committed to working in frontier markets, fragile contexts, and high-risk economies where few mainstream financing institutions dare to go.

To date, we have supported over 576 businesses in 26 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, impacted more than 36 million lives, and created over 38,000 direct jobs.

AECF is headquartered in Kenya and has offices in Côte d’Ivoire, Tanzania, Nigeria, South Sudan, Benin, and Somalia.

2.0 About the Kakuma Kalobeyei Challenge Fund (KKCF)

Kakuma Kalobeyei Challenge Fund (KKCF) is a five-year Program of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), implemented with Africa Enterprise Challenge Fund (AECF), Turkana County Government, and UNHCR. KKCF originates from the market data from IFC’s “Kakuma as a Marketplace” study, which quantified Kakuma’s economy and confirmed that it was a dynamic and potential marketplace. This triggered a lot of interest that contributed to KKCF’s conceptualization and Program development.

KKCF is designed to support private sector investment and unlock the economic potential of refugees and their hosts in the Kakuma Kalobeyei refugee hosting area in Turkana West District of Turkana County. KKCF aims to attract private companies and grow the local entrepreneurship potential to create job opportunities, present more consumption choices, and contribute to fair pricing of products and services. KKCF targets all sizes of companies, from small to medium-sized family businesses to social enterprises and large firms. For more information, visit https://kkcfke.org/

KKCF applies a competitive financing mechanism for disbursing donor funding to incentivize companies to start or scale existing operations in the Kakuma-Kalobeyei area. The process begins by advertising a call for proposals, and applicants are then subjected to a competitive selection process, leading to the identification of companies that are best aligned to the Kakuma-Kalobeyei market dynamics to then deliver the intended socio-economic impact to the host and refugee communities while also contributing to the development of Turkana County.

With the Kakuma-Kalobeyei area being a marginalized and fragile setting, KKCF supports these companies to manage business limitations prevalent in such challenging environments, including limited access to financing, low availability of technically qualified and experienced staff, complex social and cultural conditions, a slow and bureaucratic regulatory environment, and fragmented, low-income, and remote markets with poor infrastructure. KKCF support includes the provision of concessional capital, technical assistance, and policy advocacy to improve the business environment. This collaborative Program focuses on building commercially viable and sustainable businesses that can:

• Increase incomes for both refugees and host communities.
• Provide essential goods and services.
• Create jobs and stimulate economic growth.
• Improve living standards for those in the refugee camp and surrounding communities.
• Promote financial inclusion efforts focused on increasing access to finance for women and youth.

KKCF is currently working with 105 commercially viable and sustainable microenterprises and 19 Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) across diverse economic sectors.

3.0 About the assignment

The main objective of this consultancy is to carry out a survey, identify and analyze key market risks affecting enterprises and value chains in the Kakuma-Kalobeyei area and generate recommendations for strengthening enterprise resilience and sustainable economic engagement, with a focus on both refugee and host community enterprises.

Specific objectives:

1. To quantify the extent to which KKCF-supported businesses have been affected by changes in donor-related funding flows.
2. To identify how business performance indicators such as revenue, customer base, product diversification, and cash flow have evolved.
3. To assess employment-related impacts, including workforce reduction, wage delays, or changes in employment terms.
4. To document strategies that businesses have used to cope with reduced market demand or increased operational challenges.
5. To evaluate resilience traits and business continuity practices among MSMEs.
6. To explore the perspectives of businesses on future growth opportunities and the support needed to navigate a donor-constrained environment.
7. To provide practical recommendations to AECF/KKCF and ecosystem actors on enterprise support in fragile and evolving contexts.

The purpose of these TORs is to define the scope, responsibilities, expectations, and deliverables of the engagement expected by AECF from the selected Consultant. The successful service provider must demonstrate experience and understanding of the refugee context and the Kakuma Kalobeyei market.

4.0 Specific duties and responsibilities (the “Services”) of the Consultant

The Consulting Firm will be expected to deliver on the following scope of the assignment:

a) Desk Review

• Review relevant documents, including KKCF sectoral reports, previous business performance baselines, funding landscape analysis, and regional economic assessments.
• Identify key inflection points in donor funding reduction.

b) Tool Design

• Design quantitative survey tools targeting business owners/managers.
• Develop qualitative interview guides for key informants and Focus group discussion (FGD) moderators.
• Ensure tools incorporate gender, refugee/host status, business size, and sector, among other cross-cutting themes.

c) Data Collection

• Conduct a quantitative survey of all active KKCF-supported enterprises.
• Conduct Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) with stakeholders, including financial institutions, sector partners, local government, and ecosystem players.
• Conduct Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) with business owners, disaggregated by gender, age group, and location.

d) Data Analysis

• Analyze quantitative data using descriptive and inferential statistics.
• Apply thematic analysis to qualitative data to identify patterns, perspectives, and contextual insights.

e) Validation and Reporting

• Facilitate a validation workshop to present preliminary findings and gather feedback.
• Finalize the report based on stakeholder inputs.

f) Future Outlook and Co-created Solutions

• Synthesize business owners’ suggestions on how to navigate the future market and funding landscape.
• Identify what support, such as financial, policy, partnerships, and Technical assistance (TA) they consider most critical.
• Highlight innovations and models that emerged during funding shortfalls.

Map opportunities for business continuity and growth in the post-donor context.

5.0 Deliverables

The Consulting Firm is expected to deliver the following:

1. Inception Report – Detailing methodology, work plan, sampling tools, and stakeholders to be consulted
2. Survey tools – A detailed report outlining the survey/Interview instruments.
3. Data sets – Quantitative and qualitative data sets that can be independently validated.
4. Draft Market Risk Assessment Report – Including findings, Case study examples, and preliminary recommendations.
5. Validation Workshop – Presentation of findings to stakeholders for feedback.
6. Final Report – Comprehensive report incorporating stakeholder inputs from the validation workshop and any other feedback received.
7. A Summary policy brief – An executive summary with actionable recommendations.

6.0 Duration of the assignment

The assignment is expected to commence in September 2025 and is expected to be completed in two (2) months from the commencement date.

7.0 Reporting

The Consultant will report to the Senior Advisory Officer at the AECF and the KKCF Program Manager.

8.0 Proposal submission

Interested and qualified consulting individuals or teams are invited to submit their proposal(s) comprising the following:

1. A technical proposal:

• An understanding of the consultancy requirements.
• Methodology and work plan for performing the assignment, underpinned by a demonstration of value for money
• Detailed reference list indicating the scope and magnitude of similar assignments.
• Relevant services undertaken in the last five (5) years.
• Letters of signed reference from at least 3 previous companies/assignments
• CVs of the technical team.
• Registration and other relevant statutory documents (this applies to Institutional consultants).

2. A financial proposal

• Clearly showing the proposed team member, roles, and proposed days, and the proposed professional fee (daily rate and total amount per team member). The financial proposal shall also include an indication of reimbursables (travel, communication, etc.). Currency to be in KES.

N/B: Technical and financial proposals should be submitted separately. Combining the financial and technical documents into one document will automatically disqualify the applicant.

9.0 Qualifications and experience

The Consulting Firm should possess the following skills and/or credentials:

• Minimum Proven experience of 5+ years conducting market assessments, risk surveys, or economic studies in humanitarian or low-resource settings.
• Proven experience conducting socio-economic surveys in fragile or refugee-hosting settings.
• Strong understanding of MSME development, private sector dynamics, and humanitarian-development nexus programming.
• Expertise in designing and managing mixed-method evaluations.
• Experience in enterprise ecosystem analysis and livelihood assessments.
• Proficiency in local languages (Swahili, Turkana) and cultural sensitivity in refugee/host settings.
• Strong analytical, reporting, and stakeholder engagement capabilities.
• Knowledge of the development sector and particularly working in the Kakuma/Kalobeyei area is an added advantage.

10.0 Evaluation criteria

Mandatory evaluation criteria for firms:

Mandatory Requirements for firms: –

1. Company profile.
2. Trading license or Certificate of incorporation or Certificate of Registration, and other statutory documents.
3. Valid Tax Compliance certificate (Applicable to firms).
4. Passport/National Identification of the lead consultant and key personnel
5. All documents related to the technical & financial proposal MUST be compiled and submitted separately as PDF documents, organized with a clear Table of Contents.

N/B: Failure to attach and adhere to the above requirements will result in automatic disqualification

An evaluation committee will be formed by the AECF and may include employees of the businesses to be supported. All members will be bound by the same standards of confidentiality. The consultant should ensure that they fully respond to all criteria to be comprehensively evaluated.

The AECF may request and receive clarification from any consultant when evaluating a proposal. The evaluation committee may invite some or all the consultants to appear before the committee to clarify their proposals. In such an event, the evaluation committee may consider such clarifications in evaluating proposals.

In deciding the final selection of a qualified bidder, the technical quality of the proposal will be given a weighting of 80% based on the evaluation criteria. Only the financial proposal of those bidders who qualify technically will be opened. The financial proposal will be allocated a weighting of 20% and the proposals will be ranked in terms of total points scored.

The mandatory and desirable criteria against which proposals will be evaluated are identified in the table below.

11.0 Pricing

The AECF is obliged by the Kenyan tax authorities to withhold taxes on service contract fees as well as ensure that VAT is charged where applicable. Applicants are advised to ensure that they have a clear understanding of their tax position with regard to the provisions of the Kenya tax legislation when developing their proposals.

12.0 Application details

The AECF is an Equal Opportunity Employer. The AECF considers all interested candidates based on merit without regard to race, gender, colour, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, disability, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law.

• Interested consultancy firms are requested to submit their technical and financial proposal to aecfprocurement@aecfafrica.org by 29^th August 2025, 5 pm EAT
• All questions should be directed to the procurement email by 21^st August 2025, 5 pm EAT.
• The subject of the email should be “TERMS OF REFERENCE FOR CONSULTANCY SERVICES TO  CARRY OUT A SURVEY, IDENTIFY AND ANALYZE KEY MARKET RISKS AFFECTING ENTERPRISES AND VALUE CHAINS IN KAKUMA-KALOBEYEI AREA”.
•  The AECF shall not be liable for not opening proposals that are submitted with a different subject or responding to questions that did not meet the deadline as indicated.

13.0 Disclaimer

AECF reserves the right to determine the structure of the process, the number of short-listed participants, the right to withdraw from the proposal process, the right to change this timetable at any time without notice, and the right to withdraw this tender at any time, without prior notice and without liability to compensate and/or reimburse any party.

The AECF does not charge an application fee for participation in the tender process and has not appointed any agents or intermediaries to facilitate applications. Applicants are advised to reach out directly to the AECF.