Terms of Reference
Final Evaluation of Transboundary Rivers of South Asia (TROSA) Phase II: Rivers, Rights, Resilience
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Name of the Program
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Transboundary Rivers of South Asia (TROSA) Phase II: Rivers, Rights, Resilience
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Geographical coverage
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Transboundary basins of the Ganges, Brahmaputra, and Meghna (GBM) in South Asia.
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Program Timeline
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Dec 2022 – June 2026
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Evaluation Duration
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April to June 2026
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Application to be submitted to:
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Deadline:
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April 10, 2026
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I. Background
Oxfam is an international confederation of 21 organisations, working together in 79 countries. As part of a global movement for change, we are working together to end world poverty and injustice. We work with thousands of partners in countries around the world, and employ staff in a wide variety of posts. We work directly with communities, and we work with the powerful to enable the most marginalised to improve their lives and livelihoods and have a say in decisions that affect them.
Transboundary Rivers of South Asia (TROSA) is a multi-year program commenced in 2017 and supported by the Government of Sweden. TROSA Phase II: Rivers, Rights, Resilience (started from Dec 2022) aims to improve cooperation in governing shared water resources and strengthening resilience to climate change of riparian communities in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna river basins. The program works directly with communities in selected locations within the transboundary Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna (GBM) river basins, across countries.
TROSA is a multi-partner initiative with six international and ten national partners working with Oxfam International in the region. A Program Management Unit (PMU) under Oxfam International coordinates the programme, with support from two country offices in Bangladesh and Nepal.
The current phase of the programme works toward the following outcomes:
- Outcome-1: Strengthened climate-resilient livelihoods of communities living in the transboundary GBM river basins
- Outcome-2: Improved and inclusive management of transboundary river ecosystems and protection of biodiversity across the GBM river basins
- Outcome-3: Strengthened leadership of civil society, especially women, Indigenous People, and youth to influence government and private sector on water governance across and between the transboundary GBM basins
- Outcome-4: Strengthened cooperation, collaboration and accountability across and between the transboundary GBM river basins
II. About the final evaluation for TROSA II
Sida requires that:
- Evaluations shall conform to OECD/DAC’s Quality Standards for Development Evaluation. The evaluators shall use the Sida OECD/DAC Glossary of Key Terms in Evaluation.
- Evaluations should be utilisation-focused, i.e. put emphasis on who the intended users of a specific evaluation are and the intended use of the evaluation. The evaluation process shall be designed, conducted and reported to meet the needs of the intended users.
The final evaluation of TROSA II will be an end-term evaluation building on the Mid-term Review and focusing on results achieved by the Programme overall and following the Sida requirements.
All Oxfam programme evaluations also follow Oxfam’s Common Approaches to Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning and Social Accountability (CAMSA) principles.
This evaluation will be used by a set of primary and secondary users
Primary users include all TROSA partners and communities, including women and youth groups, PMU, Steering Committee, Oxfam Novib and Oxfam in Asia Regional Platform and Sida.
Secondary users include potential donors, regional and sub-regional institutions in the regions, such as UNESCAP, UN Water Convention, Joint River Commission (JRC), Water and Energy Commission (WEC) of Nepal; and Networks/communities of practice (CoP) on evaluation.
Evaluation Scope:
The Evaluation will start by April 2026 and be completed by June 2026 (report due to Oxfam in July 2026 for review and consultation, and to Sida by September 2026).
- Phases: The evaluation will cover TROSA Phase -II program duration (December 2022-June 2026) and will also take into account continued results from Phase 1 (2017-22).
- Partners and stakeholders: The evaluation will cover all TROSA partners and allies, governance units (PMU, Steering Committee) and other relevant stakeholders directly or indirectly engaged in the project and people we work with in TROSA phase-II.
- Processes: Key processes of design, partnership, implementation, budget and fund management, governance of the program, communications, MEAL, audits, risk management and adaptations will be analyzed to look at their relevance, coherence, efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability.
- Geography: The evaluation will cover program implementation basins and communities in Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Bhutan. TROSA Phase II, being a regional water governance initiative, a focus of the results and impacts evaluation will be at the basin and regional levels. This will also assess the coherence and connectedness among diverse activities and strategies for more basin and regional level outputs and impacts.
- Transboundary Cooperation: Transboundary cooperation is an important element of the programme. This evaluation will analyse the impact of transboundary cooperation among partners and other program stakeholders.
- Learning Synthesis: Analyse and collate the learning and reflection on the different dimensions of program implementation, key approaches, and strategies for influencing various stakeholders and decision makers, lessons learned on innovation, unintended changes, and external factors that supported Oxfam and its partners.
Minimum Qualifications:
Required
- >7-year experience in international program evaluation, with significant knowledge and experience of evaluation concepts and approaches for advocacy and influencing programs;
- Academic degree (Master’s as minimum) in natural resources management, climate change, international development, business and human rights and gender equality;
- Demonstrated experience in evaluating regional programs, gender equality, civil society strengthening, policy influencing and natural resource management.
- Demonstrated experience with different designs and methodologies for evaluation, including those with a participatory nature.
- Strong qualitative and quantitative analytical skills.
- Demonstrated high-level proficiency in written and spoken English, with clear and concise analysis, and in developing reports that include visual representation of data.
Preferred
- Knowledge of working with CSOs and their engagement in water cooperation and hydro-diplomacy issues.
- Experience conducting international research in South Asia.
- Available language skills other than English (team members with competencies in the following: Nepali, Hindi, Bengali and Bhutanese).
- Good understanding of GBM basin contexts and the larger geopolitics, hydro-diplomacy, gender equality and human rights issues in these regions.
- Good understanding of roles of and relations between governments, sub-regional/regional forums, corporate and civil society actors on transboundary water governance, inclusive business and human rights.
- Prior experience in research on countries in which TROSA operates
- Understanding of Sida requirements.
Data Protection: The evaluation agency will follow the data protection policy of Oxfam while collecting, processing, and storing the programme-related data.
For detailed information, please check the complete version of the ToR attached below