Source document: https://docs-lawep.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/1698927025152.pdf (Saint Vincent and the Grenadines)
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines CARIBBEAN DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION PROJECT Terms of Reference Project Officer Summary The Government of St. Vincent and the Grenadines (GoSVG) has received financing from the World Bank Group to implement the Caribbean Digital Transformation Project (CARDTP or the Project).
The CARDTP comprises four components that address key bottlenecks and harness opportunities to develop the Eastern Caribbean Digital Economy as a driver of growth, job creation, and improved service delivery.

The CARDTP’s development objective is “to increase access to digital services, technologies, and skills by governments, businesses, and individuals in the participating Eastern Caribbean countries.
It leverages public sector modernization and digitization to improve service delivery and drive a digital culture across the region.” As such, the CARDTP will finance the cross-cutting enablers of digital government, digitize specific priority services, fill existing infrastructure gaps, and contribute to the expansion of the benefits of public sector modernization to citizens and businesses.
To support the improved management of digital risks, the project will bolster cybersecurity policy, capacity, and planning tools in the region.

It will facilitate technology adoption to improve the productivity of flagship industries and create demand for digitally enabled jobs.
It also aims to foster regional integration and cooperation to capture the economies of scale and scope required to increase the impact and value for money of the project interventions and create a more competitive, seamless regional digital market to attract investment and provide room for the growth of digital firms.

The CARDTP includes activities to be implemented at the regional and national levels.
National-level activities will be financed through an IDA credit to Saint Vincent and the Grenadines in the amount of US$30 million.

The Project is also financed through a regional IDA grant and implemented by a regional Project Implementation Unit (RPIU) housed at the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS).

RPIU will work with other regional institution stakeholders as relevant depending on the technical area being supported.
Regionally implemented activities will focus on strengthening the enabling environment to promote investment, competition, and innovation in telecoms and digital financial services, regional cybersecurity collaboration, and a modernized and harmonized data protection and privacy regime across the region.

It will also be complemented by a regional-level advanced digital skills program open to high-potential digital specialists from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.
Scope of Services The position of Project Officer is a contracted full-time staff position.

Work will be performed at the office of the Project Implementation Unit (PIU), Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Information Technology located in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

The PO will report directly 1 to the Project Coordinator and shall be responsible for providing day-to-day project support services in relation to the implementation of the CARDTP.
The Project Officer will liaise closely with the relevant line ministries and departments within the GoSVG, the Implementation Support Firm, and the World Bank project team.

S/He will assist the Project Coordinator in organizing and planning project implementation activities with respect to procurement, contracting, financial management, safeguards management, contract supervision, reporting, and all other aspects of the CARDTP’s operations.
The Project Officer will assist the Project Coordinator in ensuring that the participating ministries, agencies, and Technical Working Groups (TWGs) are appropriately involved with project activities.

Duties and responsibilities The Project Officer will be supported by the CARDTP project staff and the general administrative personnel in providing project administrative support, assisting in the monitoring of project activities, and in making recommendations to help resolve project bottlenecks.
Specifically, the Projects Officer will be required to: 1.

Provide administrative support to the CARDTP project implementation unit (PIU).

2.

Keep track of the Ministries, Agencies, and TWGs reporting and deliverables timeline and follow up with them for timely submission.

3.
3.

Assist the Project Coordinator in managing activities within the project team in coordination with the PIU and ensure timely reporting and preparation of project documentation as needed particularly with respect to Bank project reporting requirements and requests for World Bank’s ‘No Objection’.

4.

Advise and regularly report to the Project Coordinator on CARDTP project implementation activities, and program plans and recommend project implementation strategies.

5.
5.

Engage and coordinate appropriate line ministry and stakeholder support as needed to advance project objectives.

6.

Provide documentation on the status of implementation and include recommendations for actions to address any bottlenecks in the line ministries and agencies.

7.
7.

Assist the Project Coordinator in the preparation of regular project progress reports, including quarterly monitoring reports for submission to The World Bank, identifying potential implementation risks in achieving the PDOs within the requisite times, and actively proposing potential solutions.

8.

Liaising with relevant stakeholders for input and feedback in the preparation and review of consultants’ reports and documents.

Page | 2 9.
Page | 2 9.

Assist in the review of bidding documents, requests for proposals, requests for bids, expressions of interest, or other documents required to engage consultants and bidders.

10.

Perform procurement support activities including bid evaluation and contract management.

11.

Perform other related duties as assigned by the Director of General Finance and Planning.
Qualifications and Experience Prospective candidates should have a minimum of the following qualifications: - A bachelor’s degree in management, business administration, economics, project management, or a related discipline - Experience in the public sector would be an asset.

- Demonstrated experience in stakeholder engagement activities will be an asset - Experience with programs or project portfolios of multilateral or bilateral institutions (e.g.
The World Bank, Caribbean Development Bank, and the European Union) will be an asset.

- Strong interpersonal and organizational skills - Excellent report-writing skills - Analytical thinker with creative problem-solving skills and attention to detail - Demonstrated proficiency in MS Office Suite - Fluency in English Reporting Obligations The Project Officer will report to the Director General of Finance and Planning through the Project Coordinator.
The Projects Officer will be required to submit the following reports: - Quarterly progress reports - Annual Project Performance Reports - Mid-term and Project Completion Reports - End of Assignment Report - Other reports as required Contract Duration The duration of the contract is two (2) years and will be subject to renewal based on the consultant’s satisfactory performance and work availability.

Remuneration Remuneration will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.
Page | 3 Contract Performance Evaluation The Project Officer may be subject to evaluation of performance based on the Performance Indicators as per Annex 2.
Page | 4 ANNEX 1 – PROJECT DESCRIPTION The CARDTP has four (4) components through which the Project Development Objective will be achieved: PROJECT COMPONENTS The following provides a brief description of the project components: Component 1: Digital Enabling Environment This component will support the development of a positive enabling environment in St. Vincent and the Grenadines digital economy that drives competition, investment, and innovation while promoting trust and security of online transactions.
It will focus on legal, regulatory, and institutional reforms to support the modernization of the telecommunications and digital financial services sectors while mitigating growing risks of a digital economy, including cybersecurity and data protection and privacy.
The project will also support the development of national-level cybersecurity capability to monitor, identify, protect against, and respond to cyber threats and support for requisite enabling environment and capacity improvements at the national level.

The Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) will be established using a regionally compatible design and frameworks developed as part of the regionally implemented activities under the subcomponent.

The subcomponents are as follows: 1.


Subcomponent 1.1: Telecommunications: Legal and Regulatory Environment, Institutions and Capacity 2.

Subcomponent 1.2: Digital Financial Services: Legal and Regulatory Environment, Institutions and Capacity 3.
Subcomponent 1.3: Cybersecurity, Data Protection, and Privacy Component 2: Digital Government Infrastructure, Platforms, and Services This component will support public sector modernization, resilience, and delivery of digital public services to individuals and businesses.
It will aim to ensure that St. Vincent and the Grenadines put in place the core infrastructure, platforms, institutions, and human capacity needed to manage internal government operations efficiently and effectively and to build on these core enablers to make public services widely accessible online from anywhere within the country, region or across the globe.
It will also prepare the GoSVG for deeper interconnectivity and interoperability of data and information systems across borders to smooth the administration of regional trade, immigration, and other services between countries.
Finally, it will aim to ensure continuity of government operations and services, enable real-time data-driven decision-making, facilitate remote working for civil servants, and ability to rapidly target and deliver payments and social services to citizens and businesses in the event of natural disasters and external shocks.

The subcomponents are as follows: 1.

Subcomponent 2.1: Cross-Cutting Enablers of Digital Government Operations and Services Page | 5 2.
Subcomponent 2.2: Government Productivity Platforms and Citizen-Centric Digital Services Component 3: Digital Skills and Technology Adoption This component aims to better equip individuals and businesses in St. Vincent and the Grenadines for the jobs and economy of the future and to spur innovation and productivity growth.

It aims to create a pool of advanced digital talent to better position St. Vincent and the Grenadines to attract investment by digital firms.
It takes a comprehensive supply and demand side approach, supporting greater technology adoption and utilization of digitally enabled business models to drive demand for newly skilled employees as well as making connections with global employment opportunities through online working platforms.

The subcomponents are as follows: 1.

Subcomponent 3.1: Workforce-Ready Digital Skills 2.
Subcomponent 3.2: Technology Adoption Component 4: Project Implementation Support This component will support the national Project Implementation Unit (PIU) with the management and implementation of the project and associated activities.
The project will support capacity- building initiatives, as well as PIU staffing through the hiring of expert consultants for key areas such as project management, technical advisory and implementation support, procurement, financial management, environment and social safeguards, monitoring and evaluation, and strategic communications.
INSTITUTIONAL ARRANGEMENTS The GoSVG, recognizing the cross-cutting as well as technical nature of the activities being implemented has proposed a multi-layer implementation structure, with an independent PIU housed in the Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning, and Information Technology.

The PIU will utilize existing procurement and financial management capacity within the Ministry to augment the PIU capacity.
As seen in figure A1 below, the project implementation arrangements account for cross-government coordination at strategic and operational levels, as well as regional coordination through the participation of the responsible line ministry official in the regional project oversight committee.

The roles and responsibilities of the PIU and other Project counterparts are described in Table A1 below.
Page | 6 Figure A1: Implementation arrangements Table A1: Roles and responsibilities of PIU and other Project counterparts Agency Roles and Responsibilities Project Steering Committee (PSC) PIU Technical Working Groups (TWG) Facilitate coordination between the different ministries and regional implementation mechanism and address policy issues impacting project implementation.
Responsible for overall oversight of project implementation progress, including review of annual implementation plans and progress reports.
PSC members include Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning, and Information Technology; Ministry of Legal Affairs; Ministry of Education, National Reconciliation, and Information; Ministry of Housing, Settlements, Land Surveys, and Physical Planning The PIU is housed in the Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Information Technology and is staffed with experts as shown in Figure A1 above.
It is responsible for coordinating and managing the Project, facilitating inter- ministerial coordination, and implementing digital initiatives across the various ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) of the GoSVG.

The TWGs comprise representatives from the beneficiary MDAs of the GoSVG as well as private sector stakeholders who will benefit from the specific project activity implementation.
The TWG will support the PIU and the Consultant by providing guidance and advice in the specific activity, documenting existing business processes, assist with the drafting and finalizing of terms of references (TORs), requests for quotations (RFQs), requests for bids (RFBs), technical specifications and assist with the technical supervision of activity implementation.
Bid Evaluation / Selection Committees Ad-hoc bid evaluation / selection committees will be established in consultation with Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Information Technology and beneficiary MDAs and will generally consist of 3-5 qualified members.

Page | 7 ANNEX 2 – PROJECT OFFICER PERFORMANCE INDICATORS Project Officer Performance Indicators Performance metric Complied* Rating* Participate in organized stakeholder meetings 1.1 1.2.
Conduct site visits and submit reports 1.3 Attend and participate (including performing secretarial duties) in project implementation committee meetings.
Provide support to the Project Coordinator in the preparation of required reports Submit quarterly progress reports within 30 days after the 3- month reporting period Submit annual performance report within 30 days after the end 1.4 1.5 1.6 of the year 1.7 Perform administrative duties including the accurate filing of project-related correspondence *Complied:  Yes  No  N/A (not applicable) for the assessed period.
*Rating:  5 Outstanding  4 Good  3 Adequate  2 Marginally adequate  1 Unsatisfactory Page | 8