DEADLINE: 7TH JUNE, 2022
GLOBAL ALLIANCE FOR IMPROVED NUTRITION (GAIN)
REQUEST FOR EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST FOR DEVELOPING A BUSINESS CASE FOR INVESTING IN WORKFORCE NUTRITION PROGRAMMES
PROJECT BACKGROUND AND SCOPE OF WORK
ABOUT GAIN
The Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) is a Swiss-based foundation launched at the UN in 2002 to tackle the human suffering caused by malnutrition. Working with both governments and businesses, we aim to transform food systems so that they deliver more nutritious food for all people.
GAIN’s work to improve the consumption of safe and nutritious food is based on three interlinked strategic objectives:
(1) to improve the demand for safe, nutritious foods,
(2) to increase the availability of nutritious foods and enhance the nutritional value of foods, and
(3) to strengthen the enabling environment to improve the consumption of safe, nutritious foods
We build alliances between governments, local and global businesses, and civil society to deliver sustainable improvements at scale. We are part of a global network of partners working together to create sustainable solutions to malnutrition. Through alliances, we provide technical, financial and policy support to key participants in the food system. We use specific learning, evidence of impact, and results of projects and programmes to shape and influence the actions of others.
Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, GAIN has representative offices in Denmark, The Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In addition, we have country offices in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Tanzania. Programmes and projects are carried out in a variety of other countries, particularly in Africa and Asia.
GAIN’s Workforce Nutrition programme aims to improve the health of workers and farmers in low- and middle-income countries or communities through work-centred nutrition programming. Specifically, GAIN has worked with partners in various sectors but predominantly in the garment, tea and cocoa supply chains and in various locations in Africa (Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique, Ethiopia and Nigeria) and South Asia (Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Pakistan). The programmes focus on improving the access to and demand for nutritious and safe foods towards healthier diets generally. We do this by using existing business structures as entry point (workplaces or supply chains), recognizing that employers, buyers and brands in supply chains can play an important role in improving workers’ diets. In Bangladesh, for instance, iron-fortified rice and other menu improvements in garment factory mid-day meals as well as the provision of iron-folate supplements for women led to significant declines in anaemia.
The programme builds on evidence which shows that employers also benefit from effective workforce nutrition programmes: iron deficiency, low or high-body mass indices, and hypoglycaemia from skipped meals all lower work capacity or productivity. Providing healthy and varied food choices has been shown to reduce the risk of non-communicable diseases and provide enough energy and nutrients to perform tasks: this in turn reduces rates of accidents and absenteeism, increases productivity, and decreases mistakes. In addition, workplace breastfeeding support programmes have been shown to reduce absenteeism rates from various office settings in the United States. Although there are a number of studies conducted on worksite nutrition programmes, most come from high income countries, and very few have been able to estimate convincing or reliable measures on productivity outcomes, nor return on investment estimates. For example, absenteeism, a standardized productivity metric across many industries is easily measured but can be difficult to attribute to the longer-term nutrition outcomes of healthy eating. And very little has been done to study business outcomes of nutrition investments among supply chain workers, where the access to good nutrition is often constrained by low wages- and hence the benefits potentially quite large.
Businesses in supply chains are increasingly recognizing the importance of the health and well-being of workers in maintaining quality supplies. Accountability mechanisms like the World Benchmarking Alliance and the Access to Nutrition Initiative have included indicators on workforce nutrition that put more responsibility on businesses to take action. For many companies, this work also aligns well with the reporting on environmental, social and governance (ESG) standards where topics like workers health and nutrition, and ethical treatment of supply chains workers are included under social sustainability standards alongside living wages and gender empowerment.
OBJECTIVES FOR WORK SOUGHT THROUGH THIS PROJECT
With this request GAIN seeks a partnership with a business school, business school affiliates, or well-respected business consultancy service who will work closely with GAIN’s Knowledge Leadership team and GAIN’s Workforce Nutrition team to develop a few select and strategic business cases for investing in worker nutrition programmes. We envision this role as thought partner, drawing on evidence and experience in developing business cases from high quality empirical data. It is anticipated that this work will take at least 6 months for Phase One (inception) and up to 2 years for Phase Two (Implementation). Phase Two will be funding dependent.
SCOPE OF WORK
The successful applicant shall provide the following services:
Conduct a thorough desk review of available information and evidence, drawing from the literature generally accepted in the business community. Publish a report.
- Regularly meet with GAIN’s WFN and KL team, and selected partners (steering committee) as part of a collaborative effort, including a kick off meeting
- Contribute to thought leadership for the approach and work bringing in relevant business-minded approach
- Work with GAIN and partners on the determination of agreeable, meaningful and standardizable business outcome measures.
- Assess with GAIN, programme approaches and their potential for impact ahead of determining their evaluability for a business case
- Develop business case proposals in 2-3 strategic selected settings and industries
- When and if proposals are funded, support or oversee (as agreed with GAIN) primary data collection, quality assurance, and data entry, cleaning, management and analyses conducted if primary data are collected. This may depend on the business partner and their willingness to have external bodies collect data, or if they will share data already collected. Regardless assessment of data quality will be important.
- If relevant, identify a local research partner (business school or other) to support conducting research in particular countries, obtain all relevant ethical approvals, access and data collection permissions as appropriate, e.g., government approvals.
- For primary data collected, ensure that GAIN receive raw and clean datasets, accompanying codebooks, and syntax and output of all data analyses. If quantitative data are collected, data documentation must be provided using Nesstar2.
- Identify opportunities for and lead in collaboration with GAIN peer-reviewed papers about business cases, approaches, methods, and similar.
- Support the dissemination of business case reports
INSTRUCTIONS FOR EXPRESSION OF INTEREST
This overall partner selection process will be managed in a 2-stage process. This initial expression of interest must be based on the information available in this request for EOIs only and does not represent a commitment to submit a full proposal should the additional details modify the interest. For those selected to submit a full proposal, no funding will be made available from GAIN for this process. GAIN anticipates inviting 2-3 EOIs to submit a full proposal. The decision will be based on understanding of the task, viability and innovation of proposed approach, and composition of the team.
CONTACT AND INQUIRIES
Staff will be available to respond to clarifications on this solicitation. Please direct all inquiries and other communications to the GAIN email address: rfp@gainhealth.org Queries sent by May 27, 2022 at 5:00pm EST will be responded to via online under the EOI announcement by June 1, 2022. Responses will not be confidential except in cases where the applicant clearly indicates that proprietary information is involved.
SUBMISSION
Expressions of Interest should be in English and submitted in electronic copy to the following e-mail address: rfp@gainhealth.org
Please include EoI: Workforce Nutrition Business Case Research in the subject line.
DEADLINE
Completed Expressions of Interest should be submitted electronically to GAIN before 5:00 pm EST on June 10, 2022.
