Foreign economic-aid-related services

Tender description

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has huge economic potential. There are 80m hectares of uncultivated arable land, vast mineral resources and over half of Africa’s water. This is countered by a very difficult business environment with very little industry. DRC ranks 184 out of 190 on the World Bank’s Doing Business survey. It performs particularly badly on contract enforcement, getting electricity, paying taxes and trading across borders. Recovery of the private sector in DRC is vital; for job creation and poverty alleviation. DFID's planned ELAN 1.2 programme will support market actors, generate market insights, demonstrate innovation and build capacity to improve the functioning of markets for poor people, ultimately delivering the Expected Impact of reducing poverty in DRC by improving the income of poor women and men in selected market systems. ELAN 1.2 will provide intensive support to a range of market functions and value chains in selected sectors, support entrepreneurship development and enterprise innovation, stimulate private sector provision of services and promote innovative and inclusive business models which have a potential to reach a large number of low-income people, using the methodology of markets systems development. A main objective of ELAN 1.2 is to deliver interventions which have a positive impact on women’s economic empowerment. The scope of work for this programme will include building on the work of the ELAN programme by: — Improving market access for poor producers, — Increasing economic activity and trade, — Creating jobs and, — Raising incomes of poor people, particularly women, adolescent girls and those from excluded and vulnerable groups.