1. BACKGROUND:

The Alliance for Financial Inclusion

The Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) is the world’s leading organization on financial inclusion policy and regulation. Currently, 90 member institutions make up the AFI network including central banks, ministries of finance and other financial policymaking or regulatory institutions from over 84 developing countries and emerging markets. AFI empowers policymakers to increase the access and usage of quality financial services for the underserved through sustainable and inclusive policies and an effective use of digital technologies. 

Policies developed and implemented by AFI members contribute to a range of the Sustainable Development Goals.  By Setting their own agenda, AFI members harness the power of peer learning to develop practical and tested policy reforms that enhance financial inclusion with strategic support from both public and private sector partners.

AFI has 7 Working Groups (WG):  Consumer Empowerment and Market Conduct Working Group (CEMCWG), Digital Financial Services Working Group (DFSWG), Financial Inclusion Data Working Group (FIDWG), Financial Inclusion Strategy Peer Learning Group (FISPLG), Global Standards Proportionality Working Group (GSPWG), Inclusive Green Finance Working Group (IGFWG) and SME Finance Working Group (SMEFWG),

As the key source of policy developments and trends in financial inclusion and as the primary mechanism for generating and incubating technical content in the network, the Working Groups serve as “communities of practice”. Providing a platform for knowledge exchange and peer learning among policymakers to share, deliberate and deepen their understanding, the working groups offer leadership and expertise in their respective policy fields and support the network to monitor new developments in emerging fields.

The knowledge generated via the working groups is disseminated for implementation by a range of capacity building activities such as Joint Learning Programs, Member Trainings, Trainings by Private Sector Partners. The practical experience members garner from engaging in peer learning based capacity building is then applied by members as in country implementation projects which are supported by the provision of financial or technical support to AFI member institutions in conducting activities that aim to deliver financial inclusion policies, regulations, supervisory tools or enablers for the development of policies, such as national financial inclusion strategies. 

The working groups receive strategic guidance and insight from the High-Level Global Standards & Policy Committee, while the  Gender Inclusive Finance Committee, supports WGs in integrating gender considerations into all aspects of their work and support members in fulfilling their Denarau Action Plan (updated 2022) commitment to promote women’s financial inclusion.

AFI members have made further commitments in a range of other accords which can be read here.

The AFI’s five regional initiatives complete the AFI platform of services by supporting policy implementation in Africa (AfPI), Latin America and the Caribbean (FILAC), the Pacific Islands (PIRI), Eastern Europe and Central Asia (ECAPI) and the Arab Region (FIARI).  

2. PROJECT BACKGROUND:

As a member-driven organization, the Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) continuously builds its member orientation, to being responsive and flexible, to best cater to its members’ needs and expectations.

AFI has embarked on a two-year project in the State of Palestine with the support of the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, Directorate for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Affairs MFEA, Luxembourg to advance Gender-Inclusive Finance and Digital Financial Services in Palestine. The objective of the project is to support Palestine in advancing the development and implementation of well-informed, innovative, and sustainable financial inclusion policies and regulations, with a focus on digital financial services and gender inclusive finance. An overarching objective of this project is to support increasing women’s financial inclusion in Palestine and reducing the gender gap.

The project has four main outcomes:

1. Strengthened Policy Ecosystem for Women’s Financial Inclusion – Enhanced knowledge and capacity of the Palestine Monetary Authority (PMA) and key national stakeholders to develop and implement gender-inclusive financial policies.
2. Improved Financial Products and Services for Women – Increased accessibility of gender-responsive financial products and services to support women’s financial inclusion.
3. Enhanced Data-Driven Policy and Regulation – Strengthened data collection and analytical capabilities to inform evidence-based policy decisions and facilitate the development of inclusive financial solutions.
4. Increased Regional and Global Advocacy – Strengthened engagement of PMA in regional and global financial inclusion dialogues, ensuring greater visibility and influence on key policy issues.

This project builds upon AFI’s previous support, including the development of the National Financial Inclusion Strategy (NFIS) in 2018 and the national demand-side survey in 2022, which generated sex-disaggregated data that informed the formulation of two strategic roadmaps on gender-inclusive finance and digital awareness. The current initiative is designed to facilitate the Palestine Monetary Authority’s (PMA) implementation of these roadmaps, ensuring an evidence-based and structured approach to advancing women’s financial inclusion.

3. OVERALL OBJECTIVE:

The main objective of this consultancy is to conduct a terminal evaluation of the design and implementation of Luxembourg Government’s support to AFI for financial inclusion in Palestine (September 2023 to September 2025). The evaluation will assess the project’s effectiveness, relevance, coherence, efficiency, impact and sustainability, capturing learnings and providing strategic recommendations to inform future programming support to financial inclusion in Palestine.

The evaluation will seek to:

• Review the relevance of the project in addressing members’ financial inclusion policy priorities and needs, identify gaps and opportunities at the activity level to ensure AFI’s future service delivery meets members’ needs;
• Review the coherence of the project within the organizational AFI Phase IV strategy, in relation to the delivery of other services and benefits provided by the AFI Management Unit (MU);
• Review the effectiveness and efficiency of implementation of the project by the AFI Management Unit;
• Review the sustainability of the approach taken by AFI in the project, which includes the extent it is contributing to gender inclusive finance through digital financial services within the State of Palestine;
• Review the results framework of the project and its sufficiency in measuring and reporting on project outcomes, with a view on capturing potential impact-level changes; and
• Generate recommendations that capture the lessons learned from this project that will be incorporated in the planning of similar support in the future.

This assignment seeks experienced project or program evaluators who have worked in grant-making facilities. This assignment may be conducted by an individual or a firm.

4. SCOPE OF WORK:

The Consultant is expected to review and evaluate ‘Advancing Gender-Inclusive Finance and Digital Financial Services in Palestine’ project with lessons learned and recommendations for future phases of the project.

 The tasks that are expected to achieve this objective include:

• Conduct a desk review of the project documents, relevant AFI strategic documents, and other documents as advised by the AFI Monitoring & Evaluation Unit;
• Conduct remote interviews with AFI staff, and the Palestinian Monetary Authority and other relevant stakeholders;
• Develop key deliverables (as detailed in the next section) required for the evaluation;
• Provide weekly progress updates to the AFI Monitoring & Evaluation Unit; and
• Prepare presentations for the AFI Management Unit.

5. TIMELINE AND DELIVERABLES:

This work would be undertaken between July 2025 and September 2025. The key deliverables for the assignment are as follows:

1. Evaluation matrix and workplan – the evaluation matrix outlines the approach and methodology of this review, including research questions that address the scope defined above;
2. Annotated outline of the report – the provisional document contains the key findings generated from the assessments and recommendations as defined in the overall objective above;
3. Draft review report (.docx) and presentations to AFI (up to 2 presentations) on review findings (.pptx); and
4. Final report with recommendations.

The timeline for this assignment is indicated below:

6. TRAVEL:

No travel is expected for this assignment. The consultant(s) will work remotely and undertake virtual meetings to complete the tasks, in coordination with AFI HQ in Kuala Lumpur.

7. CONSULTANT EXPERIENCE:

The evaluation professional or team must have the following qualifications:

• Relevant academic qualifications: Advanced degree in international development, economics, finance or other related fields;
• Professional experience in international development: More than 10 years of professional experience in international development, specifically in financial inclusion and/or in grant-making facilities. Prior professional engagement with financial regulatory entities particularly in developing countries will be an added advantage;
• Experience in undertaking program and/or project reviews and evaluation: more than 8 years of professional experience undertaking project and/or project reviews in developing or emerging economies is compulsory;
• Experience in qualitative and quantitative research methods: Experience in data collection, quantitative and qualitative research are required; strong research, reporting and analytical skills with practical experience in engaging with public sector stakeholders are desired;
• Language and report writing skills: Fluency in English (oral and written) is compulsory; French and Spanish (oral) are an added advantage.

8. REPORTING:

The consultant(s) will report to AFI’s Monitoring and Evaluation department and is expected to provide weekly progress updates (in English).

The workplan submitted by the consultant(s) along with the evaluation matrix will be used for the monitoring and supervision of the progress of this consultancy assignment.

9. PAYMENT TERMS:

The payment terms/schedule proposed for this consultancy are as following:

10. PROPOSAL SUBMISSION INFORMATION:

Proposals will be due with the following requirements for submission:

10.1      Retention of Proposals

All proposals submitted become the property of AFI. AFI will make all reasonable efforts to maintain proposals in confidence and will release proposals only to personnel involved with the evaluation of the project. Proprietary information should be identified in each proposal. 

11. Evaluation Criteria

The proposals submitted will be evaluated based on the following criteria:

 Evaluation of technical and financial proposals

AFI reserves the right to award the most suitable proposal based on the evaluation of combined criterion, where bidders are qualified by the combined valuation of the technical and financial proposals, with the following weightage:

i) Technical Proposal: 70% (Seventy percent)

ii) Financial Proposal: 30% (Thirty percent)

How to Apply

Interested applicants are expected to submit a proposal with an updated CV and using the template given by email to AFI’s Procurement & Contracts Office at rfp2515@afi-global.org by 16 April 2025.

Note: AFI does not tolerate copyright infringement, including and not limited to infringement, in the form of plagiarism. Consultant or consulting entity awarded a contract by AFI shall take responsibility to ensure that the authored works, produced in parts or as an entirety of the deliverables stated in this RFP does not infringe on copyrights.

The final decision on the selection of a consultant/consulting firm for this project rests with AFI management team and with the Inquiry. Only shortlisted and successful consultants will be contacted.