Forest Governance, Markets and Climate (FGMC2) Facilitation Service

Phase 2 of the Forest Governance, Markets and Climate (FGMC2) is a 10-year £500m programme that aims to reduce the illegal and unsustainable use of forest resources, while benefitting poor, forest-dependent people, especially Indigenous People and Local Communities. FGMC2 builds on a successful first phase (FGMC1: 2011-24) which provided evidence and strong foundational partnerships that drove governance reforms and improved forest stewardship.

A first tranche of £220m was approved for the first 5 years of the programme (2024-29), with the balance to be approved by Ministers subject to a positive mid-term evaluation in 2029 and resource availability. The key delivery instruments for the programme are (i) Facilitation service, the subject of this procurement opportunity, (ii) the Programme Management Strategy and Support Team (PMSST), and (iii) the Technical Assistance Portfolio Manager (TAPM) the latter two contracts have been awarded .

The Facilitation Service (contract value up to £15m) is designed to provide the services of politically astute, skilled and impartial facilitators to support multi stakeholder deliberations, at the invitation of government. The objective of the Facilitation Services contract is to establish and operate a Facilitation service with the capacity to deploy country-based facilitators who will help encourage and support national stakeholders in forest sector policy and legal reforms decision making, encouraging well-informed stakeholder deliberations in partner countries.

FGMC2 will not operate in all countries (potentially in up to 16) from the outset and is unlikely to work with Facilitators simultaneously across all countries. The nature of the work delivered in each country will depend upon the country context and the strategies and theories developed for it.

The first group of 7 countries that will require facilitation services is Ghana, Liberia, Republic of Congo, DRC, Cameroon, Papua New Guinea, and Guyana. Other countries (bringing the total up to 10 countries at any given time) are likely to be drawn from Solomon Islands, Indonesia, Vietnam, and as further scoping is carried out, potentially from Laos, Gabon, Cote d’Ivoire, Bolivia, Cambodia, Mozambique, Myanmar, Thailand.

Scope is, therefore, restricted identifying named facilitators for the 7 confirmed countries, but cost for a total of 10 facilitators. This contract award has the original financial limit of £11,204,365.16 (inclusive of local government taxes) covering a period of 48 months. In order to of accommodate any anticipated extension of up to 60 months, an additional budget of £20 million (as captured in the Contract Terms of Reference, para 44) may be available taking the total possible period of this contract and value to up to 108 months and £31,204,365.16 respectively, which is to be agreed at the end of the original contract period (48 months) subject to considerations stipulated under para 47 (Timeframe) of the Terms of Reference.