Call for tender: procurement of services connected to the joint strategy to be developed within RECO Baltic 21Tech

Deadline for submission has been extended until 3rd of September 2012 - 12.00

RECO Baltic 21 Tech (RB21T) is a Waste Management project co-financed by the Baltic Sea Programme Interreg IVB, 2010-2013. Waste management is a matter of great concern to Baltic Sea countries, where significant national disparities are seen. Insufficient transnational actions in the field of waste management hamper the development for the Baltic Sea Region (BSR) and poses both environmental and economic challenges. Recently the EU set new and extensive directives for waste generation to stabilise from 2012 and decline from 2020.

Additionally a waste hierarchy was introduced:

Prevent
Reuse
Recycle material
Recycle energy
Disposal.

Climbing the hierarchy implies an indisputable challenge for the countries since the authorities often experience a lack of knowledge, capacity and funds to initiate aprocess of

evaluating more than one alternative
carry out adequate procurement and
to find an instrument that catalyses and multiplies the process.

A poor execution of the process, results both in long-term dependencieson single perspective solution and an imbalanced overcapacity on a regional and national level.

Insufficient transnational actions in WM clearly hamper the development of the EU. RB21T responds to these great challenges by strengthening local and regional capacity to climb the waste hierarchy to meet the EU-directives. The overall objective of the project isto improve the local and regional capacity to apply the process of implementing waste management that support the impl ementation of the EU Waste Management Directive, helping countries in the Baltic Sea Region to address their problems with waste management and disposal. RB21T will establish a transnational and cross-sectorial platform for expertise exchange in WM, which all inall will increase competitiveness of the EU.

RB21T is an offspring to a WM initiative that started as a bilateral cooperation between the cities of Stockholm and St Petersberg in 1998. Along the way a first RECO project, also co-financed by ERDF funds, was carried out 2004-2007. Due to the long collaboration history and clearly defined goals and objectives the current project relies on a solid and devoted partnership. This collaboration history between a large number of countries with different systems, administrative procedures, culture, language and WM advancement will be a central trait when spreading the RB21T method to regions beyond the BSR. RB21T strongly believes that its lessons learnt during the years will provide for an ability to avoid foreseeable and decelerating obstacles, be that administrative, legislative, cultural or technological.

RB21T will target 30 decision makers on local/regional and national level when facing a WM investment and will assist decision makers to develop sustainable investments in correspondence to latest research and BAT worldwide, via matchmaking events and database creation. RB21T will establish relation with at least 4 EU networks with worldwide associations in WM (ISWA, MEDA, EUREKA, ESPON) to increase dissemination, to reach BAT and to make a better model/strategy. RB21T willestablish one transnational and cross-sectorial platform for expertise exchange in WM in the BSR, which all in all will increase the perspectives and competitiveness of the BSR. All planned activities aims to develop 'best' pilots unlocking investments of 20 M Euro and directlinks to potential 10 investors (IFI's and private sector) that are included in the partnership as well as activities. Within the project there are aims to create the following documents:

Joint strategy – with the purpose to influence the decision makers on EU, national and local level
Investment concept – with the purpose to assist the local and national level in making the needed sustainable investments.

There is also an intention to evaluate the need fora waste management institution with the purpose to streamline the waste issue around the BSR.
More information on the project webpage www.recobaltic21.net/en.html

The Joint strategy and investment concept
RB21T is divided into 5 work packages (WP) of which WP5 will develop a joint strategy and an investment concept. Central outputs for RB21T are to make its results transferable and durable, to have an overall BSR relevance and to spread WM initiatives across the BSR. It is desirable that this cooperation is supported and guided by the respective program secretariats.
The BSR municipalities and regions lacks a long-term strategic direction for WM investments, based on life cycle cost analyses, as well as full access to experts, technologies, best practice, competence and experience. Indeed the present lack of cooperation and coordination inwaste management and spatial planning leads to: lost opportunities for using more efficient large-scale technology, a risk of over-capacity in investment in WM plants, but also to decreased possibilities of attracting EU and other funding for waste system infrastructureinvestments.
Due to these deficiencies this WP will jointly develop a strategy and general Investment Concept, supplying recommendations to increase regional capacity for municipalities and regions to meet the EU-Directives.
By creating a joint strategy and an investment concept the project will target both the national levelof the decision makers (via he joint strategy) and the more local level who is actually in charge of the investments (via the investment concept). It is thus of high importance that these two products are well thought through and elaborated in a way that will make them used and acknowledged.

Assignment
RB21T seeks a consultant supporting the developmentof the joint strategy. This requires a great deal of independency, ability to take initiatives and act on local, regional and national level. It is understood that the consultant has a strong network and good knowledge of best practices in developing these kinds of documents and from synthesis work in other relevant projects.The consultant must provide a description of its current network and any work related waste management.
The assignment has a strong focus on achieving tangible results and less focus on method. The consultant must provide a description for how they will work in relation to each task. The expected work of the consultant is to manage and compile the strategy. Writing will mostly be doneby the project partnership .
The task list should include the following:

First phase

Inventory of existing strategies. Brief report to be presented to the project. The report should include relevant strategies close to this one, but also serve as an input to the outline of this strategy.
Defining stakeholders to the strategy – The stakeholders of the strategy are high level politicians on EU and national level, these should now be named.
Suggestions for outline of the strategy.
Suggestion of content needed to fill the outline, planning of the writing etc.

Point 1 and 2 should be presented to the project for comments and discussions. Point 3 and 4 will be carried out in close cooperation with the project.

Second phase

Further development of the strategy, compile the written parts from point 4 above.
Verification of the strategy with different stakeholders including the suggested persons from point 2 above and others.
Finalisation and signing of the joint strategy.

Point 2 and 3 will be carried out with the assistance from the project. Bear in mind that this list is not exhaustive; the consultant is encouraged to add or remove items given that it is duly motivated. The consultant should also suggest suitable deliverables from the different steps.
The work will be carried out in close contact with the project manager and the rest of the management team including all WP-leaders. The work will also be presented and discussed with for example the Baltic Waste Management Council (started within RB21T), CBSS Baltic 21 Expert group, ESPON and the like. The consultant should in the proposal define how this co-operationwill take place.

Execution of the assignment
The chosen consultant will initiate the contract bya meeting together with representatives of RB21T to elaborate a detailed work plan, reporting structure and mutual expectations of the assignment. The assignment should begin at the 1st of September 2012 and the first phase will end 15th March 2013 – then the second phase will start. The second phase will end the 30th October 2013. IVL will have the right to terminate the contract after phase one if the consultant is not fulfilling their duties. The consultant must apply documented routines of quality to achieve that the assignment is conducted in a way corresponding to the agreed extension and quality. This requires internal routines for reporting etc. This demand tools and/or routines that enable a follow up of the assignment and that it achieve its goals and objectives.

Evaluation of proposals
The requirements on the consultant should be fulfilled. When that is checked an evaluation will be carried out within two categories, capacity and price.
A contract will be signed with the consultant that gets the best score after weighing the two categories. The evaluation and a first draft of agreement will be finalised at the latest 2012-08-31.

Requirements on the consultant
The proposal should include a brief explanation of the consultant, background and history of the company. The consultant should also provide a description and CV for the people representing the consultant for this assignment.
The consultant must fulfill its respective nationallegal requirements of registration, tax compliances and similar national corporate fees.
The consultant must have documented experience, competence and resources to organize and deliver services according to this call for proposal, four relevant reference projects must be listed. Knowledge of waste legislation and waste handling techniques is beneficial but nota requirement.
The consultant must present a plan for how the co-operation with the project will be managed in the most efficient way.
Additionally the consultant should describe its environmental policy regardless of an environmental management system is in place or not.

The consultant is required to supply the following documentation:

A copy of valid certificate of registration
Proof that all tax and fees are paid and up to date
A copy of quality management certificate, or description
A copy of environmental certificate, or description

Capacity
The consultant must be able to work independently, as mentioned previously, and must therefore describe previous and similar assignments, methods and results. Capacity will be evaluated from the point that the joint strategy is one of the core outputs of the project and therefore of high importance. The four reference projects will be evaluated with respect to how they meet thefollowing:

Documented experience from extensive synthesis work (max 10 p)
Documented contact with the right level of decisionmakers (max 10 p)
Documented experience from writing documents like this (max 10 p)

Apart from this the suggested work plan and description of co-operation with the project will also be evaluated (max 10p)

Price
The maximum charge for the assignment is 30 000 Euro (excl VAT). The consultant must present a detailed presentation for price per hour (Euro) and person involved in the assignment as well as costs for travels etc. All prices should be excluding national VAT.
It should also clearly specify tasks and responsibilities per person within the assignment. As a consequence the same person could have different rates for different tasks.
The price should also include a maximum price for the whole assignment as well as divided on phase oneand two.
The consultant with the lowest price will get 40 p and the one with the highest price will get 10 p.

Scoring
The capacity category will weigh 2/3 versus the price, 1/3. The proposal with the highest total score will get the assignment.

Submission of your proposal
The proposal shall be submitted electronically (e-mail) at the latest 2012-09-03, any proposal arriving later will not be evaluated. The proposal must be written in English and must be valid 30 days after the last dayof submission.
The proposal should be addressed to the contact person Åsa Stenmarck, Šī e-pasta adrese ir aizsargāta pret mēstuļošanu (spam), Jūsu pārlūkam ir jābūt aktivizētam Javascript, lai to aplūkotu . She will also be able to answer questions in relation to this call for proposal at the same e-mail address. Questions should be sent in before the 4 th July or after 13 th August.

The bidder is not entitled to any remuneration for submitting the proposal.
The maximum set of pages are 10 for the actual proposal (CVs, other documents etc are excluded)