Recrutement d’un consultant international pour l’évaluation de l’impact du COVID-19 sur les secteurs productifs et les stratégies de rétablissement en République des Seychelles, Kenya

REQUEST FOR EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST

AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT BANK

Eastern Africa Regional Development and Business Delivery Office (RDGE) Longonot Road Plot 11, Upper Hill, P.O Box 4861 -00200, Nairobi – Kenya

Email : [email protected]

1. The African Development Bank hereby invites International Individual Consultants to indicate their interest in the following assignment : “Assessment of the short to long term impact of COVID-19 on productive sectors in Seychelles and Recovery strategies” ;

Context : Seychelles, officially known as the Republic of Seychelles, is an archipelago of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean. The largest island, Mahe, with the country’s capital, Victoria lies some 1,500 kilometers (932 mi) east of mainland Africa. The country has made impressive economic progress over the past decades, with the country’s GNI per capita increasing from USD 2,080 in 1980 to USD 13,710 in 2015, thereby reaching high-income status. By 2018 the country GNI per capita reached USD 19,276, ranking Seychelles among the highest in Sub-Saharan Africa. The country’s economic growth has continued to be robust in recent years, but with COVID 19 pandemic, it is anticipated to be much lower than previously projected. GDP growth averaged 5.6% during 2011-15, and 4.2% over the 2016-2019 period. But the trend was completely reversed due to the global COVID 19 pandemic. The medium-term growth outlook generally remains positive but is also projected to be adversely impacted by the pandemic. The main transmission channels through which the pandemic could affect Seychelles’ economy are a decline in tourism activity, exports, and foreign direct investments. It is projected that there will be a 64% drop in tourist arrivals in 2020 and this will adversely impact the economy, since about 25% of Seychelles’ GDP directly relate to tourism sector. Under a base case scenario, GDP is projected to sharply contract by 10.5% in 2020 – far below the pre-COVID-19 projection of +3.3% – but is expected to rebound in 2021 reaching +7.7%, if the economy will start to recover from the third quarter of 2020. Should the outbreak persist till year’s end, which is more likely to be the case currently, growth is projected to contract by 11.6% in 2020 and recover to +7.1% in 2021.

Seychelles has also managed to maintain fiscal discipline prudent monetary policy over the last several years since the post-2008 reform program started. Most recently, during the 2016-2019 period the country achieved an overall average fiscal surplus of between 0.2% and 0.9% of GDP per year. But owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 projections point to an overall fiscal deficit of -13.8% of GDP (baseline case scenario) or – 15.2% of GDP (worst case scenario), compared to the initial projection of -0.2% of GDP for the same period. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic the Government, issued a revised 2020 budget amendment bill on 7 April 2020, showing a primary fiscal deficit of 14% which will further lead to an increase in the public debt stock. These estimates are in line with the projections of a 24% reduction in tax collection leading to a tax-to-GDP ratio of 27%, for the year compared to an average of 32% over the past five years. Specifically, the Government has committed approximately US$ 70 million to guarantee salary payment of all employees until June 2020, extended to December 2020 for Seychellois employees only, and corporate social responsibility tax, tourism marketing tax and business tax due for April, May and June have been postponed to September 2020.

thereby narrowing down the fiscal space. Government spending is projected to expand to 48.5% of GDP in 2020, up from the original pre-pandemic estimate of 40.2%. The most recent joint IMF/WB Debt Sustainability Analyses (DSA) of December 2019 indicated that the net present value of Seychelles’ public debt stood at 60% of GDP at end of 2018, compared to its level of 70% in July 2015, but was projected to decline to below 50% of GDP by end-2022 if the authorities continued to maintain annual primary fiscal surpluses at 2.5% of GDP. These plans were suspended through the April 2020 budget amendment that opened the fiscal space to support borrowing to mitigate the adverse effects of COVID-19 pandemic. Measures introduced in the budget amendment include issuance of a domestic bond and drawing from crisis response budget support facilities of the Bank, the World Bank, and the IMF. As a result, the Government has revised its end-2020 debt-to-GDP ratio target to 85.1%. The tight monetary policy stance has maintained inflation at between 1.8% and 3.7% during the 2017-2019 period. However, the inflation rate in 2020 is expected to rise to 4.5% before moderating to 3.2% in 2021 under the baseline case because of an expected depreciation of the Seychelles Rupee (SCR) and supply side disruptions emanating from the COVID-19 pandemic.

However, despite the measures taken by the authorities to minimize the socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact will continue to be significant as the country is heavily dependent on Tourism, which is the hardest hit sector by the pandemic. It therefore emerged that policy options that critically look at selected key sectors of the economy is very important and timely to help the country get back onto a sustainable development trajectory in line with its high-income status. This entails a deeper understanding of sector level effects of such a pandemic in the country, as well as experiences of countries of similar characteristics and economic structure through a methodologically robust and theoretically sound evidence based assessment of key sectors that can enhance the country’s resilience to similar shocks in the future, while sustaining medium term development in the country.

In order to deepen the understanding of sectoral effects of the pandemic and any similar shocks the African Development Bank Group (AfDB), in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance, Trade, Investment and Economic Planning, is recruiting an international consultant to carry out such an in-depth study through stocktaking of the available assessments to date, and undertaking in depth assessment of the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on selected key productive sectors in the economy as described below.

2. The assignment : Under the supervision of the Lead Economist and the management of the Chief Regional Economist, the International Consultant will perform the following tasks :

• Exhaustively examine, using an appropriate methodology, the economic effects of the COVID- pandemic on identified productive sectors of the economy: Blue economy and fishery sector; Tourism sector; Manufacturing. Special attention will be paid to the (potential) impacts of the African Continental Free Trade Area on these three (3) sectors during COVID-19 crisis ;
• Undertake a succinct impact assessment of fiscal measures and other programs implemented under the existing government response plan. The impact evaluation will also be carried out from a gender sensitive perspective ;
• Assess the immediate and medium-term effects of the pandemic and the response plan on economic growth and on the three productive sectors; including loss of productivity and employment or disruption of livelihoods, and gender dimensions ;
• Identify realistic strategic options for the rapid revival of these sectors ;
• Carry out simulations of policy options and analysis of the potential impacts of the response plan and policies to guide policy dialogue in the sectors concerned ;
• Based on the results of the analysis and impact assessment, provide advisory support and recommendations to guide the development of appropriate policies or strategic options for the recovery at sectoral and national levels ;
• Develop strategic options and socio-economic action plan in the selected productive sectors to facilitate decision-making for post-COVID economic recovery and resilience, in line with the country’s vision 2033.

3. Qualifications and Experience: The consultant must be fluent in English and should have the following qualifications :

• A PhD degree in Economics, Public Finance, Public Policy or related disciplines from a recognized university ;
• A minimum of 18 (eighteen) years relevant professional experience, of which at least 10 years is related to similar assignment on evidence-based knowledge work focused on economic policy research ;
• Knowledge of the workings of shocks and policy responses in the context of an insufficiently diversified economy, particularly in a small Island economy will be an advantage ;
• Outstanding competence in the use of Bank standard software (Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint) and econometric software such as STATA and Eviews ;
• Analytical skills, including strong understanding of econometrics and identification of data needs with sources, with a demonstrated knowledge of deriving policy recommendations from such products. Samples of such work can be attached with applications ;
• Ability to work in a multi-cultural environment and to build effective working relations with government entities or different stakeholders (colleagues, private sector, Development Finance Institutions, academia, etc.) with ability to multitask and meet tight deadlines ;
• Demonstrated experience of data collection, processing, analysis and report writing, and communication; with evidence of similar work done in the past on issues of shocks and economic recovery strategies ;
• Prior experience in an international or regional development institutions including the AfDB with a satisfactory delivery will also be an advantage ;
• Knowledge of the context and of the development issues of the private sector in Seychelles, at institutional, legislative and regulatory levels, would be an asset ;
• Knowledge of gender mainstreaming in development interventions would be an advantage.

4. Eligibility, deliverables and duration of the assignment : 

• The eligibility criteria, the establishment of a shortlist and the selection procedure must comply with the Bank’s rules and procedures for the recruitment of consultants. Please note that the interest expressed by a consultant does not imply any obligation on the part of the Bank to include the consultant in the shortlist ;
• The service, under this assignment, will involve consultancy services for a period of four (4) months. Remuneration will be in accordance with Bank rates and the qualification and experience of the consultant. The successful consultant is expected to start the work as soon as the selection process is completed and the contract signed ;
• As part of his assignment, the consultant will provide the following deliverables: i) Inception report presenting the conceptual framework, detailed methodology, and the distribution of tasks of the international consultant and national consultant; ii) Draft complete report accepted by the Bank and the Ministry; iii) Proposed options for the recovery framework and policy; and iv) A final report of the study incorporating the comments received and approved by the Bank (max. 45 pages) ;
• Interested individual consultants can obtain further information at the address below during Bank working hours : 8:00 am to 5:00 pm ;
• Expressions of interest accompanied by an updated Curriculum Vitae (CV) must be received only by email to the addresses provided below no later than November 6, 2020 at 5:00 p.m. (Nairobi time) and specifically mentioning : International Consultant for the ‘Assessment of the Impact of COVID-19 on the Productive Sectors and Recovery Strategies in the Republic of Seychelles.

For the attention of :

Ms. Brenda Wanjira,

African Development Bank

East Africa Regional Development and Business Delivery Office (RDGE)

Khushee Towers Longonot Road Plot 11, Upper Hill

P.O. Box 4861-00200 Nairobi, Kenya

Email: [email protected]

With a copy to Dr. Marcellin Ndong Ntah ([email protected]) and Dr. Tilahun Temesgen ([email protected]).

6. Establishment of the shortlist : A shortlist of three to six individual consultants will be established once the expressions of interest and the updated CV have been received. The shortlisted consultants will be evaluated on the following criteria based on their updated CVs. Shortlisted candidates will be invited to send in proposals and comments on the assignment.