TERMS OF REFERENCE
Consultancy Services for the Evaluation of the District-Wide Approach for Sustainable WASH Services in Rwanda
1. Background and Rationale
The Government of Rwanda adopted the District-Wide Approach (DWA) in 2016 as a sector-led way of working for universal and sustainable WASH services. DWA places the district at the Centre of analysis, planning, coordination, implementation and monitoring, and requires stakeholders to work through a common, evidence-based and costed district plan rather than through fragmented projects.
The original DWA was piloted in Bugesera, Gicumbi, Karongi, Ngororero and Nyamagabe. The pilot combined service-level assessment, asset inventory, institutional capacity assessment, visioning and strategy development, full life-cycle costing, financing analysis, consolidation of a district WASH plan, implementation and monitoring.
The approach was subsequently positioned for broader rollout through provincial introduction, national WASH MIS use, district coordination arrangements and development of additional district WASH investment plans. In 2020, Water For People supported the development of investment plans and engineering inputs in 12 additional districts: Gatsibo, Gakenke, Gisagara, Nyamasheke, Huye, Musanze, Burera, Rubavu, Muhanga, Nyaruguru, Kamonyi and Rutsiro, while WaterAid supported 2 additional districts, namely Rubavu and Rusizi. Under the Isoko y'Ubuzima Project (2021-2026), ten districts developed MININFRA-validated investment plans and received support on full life-cycle costing planning (Nyagatare, Kayonza, Rwamagana, Ngoma, Kirehe, Nyamagabe, Nyanza, Ruhango, Ngororero and Nyabihu)
Water For People has continuously worked in partnership with the Ministry of Infrastructure (MININFRA), WASAC and other WASH sector institutions in Rwanda to strengthen the systems required for sustainable, inclusive and resilient water, sanitation and hygiene services. In particular, Water For People has supported the District-Wide Approach from its inception through implementation, including the development of district WASH investment plans, engineering and planning inputs, full life-cycle costing, sector coordination, institutional capacity strengthening, and evidence-based planning and monitoring. Water For People also applied the principles of the District-Wide Approach in implementing the Isoko y’Ubuzima Project by supporting district-led, coordinated, and costed planning for universal and sustainable WASH services.
Building on this longstanding collaboration, Water For People will provide the financial resources required for the consultancy services described in these Terms of Reference and will work with MININFRA, WASAC, and other relevant stakeholders to evaluate the operationalization of district WASH investment plans as tools in annual planning and budgeting, application of DWA principles, and sustained changes in services and institutions.
2. Purpose of the Assignment
The purpose of the consultancy is to provide MININFRA with an independent, credible, and decision-oriented evaluation of the DWA experience in Rwanda. The evaluation will determine the extent to which districts have applied and institutionalized DWA principles in the implementation of WASH interventions and assess the impact and sustainability of WASH service delivery in the district, as well as the process and prioritization in developing, financing, implementing, monitoring, and updating the WASH investment plans.
The evaluation will examine the application of DWA in the implementation of different WASH interventions and generate practical recommendations for: (i) improving and standardizing the DWA model; (ii) embedding investment plans in district and national planning and budget cycles; (iii) strengthening implementation, monitoring and accountability; and (iv) informing any future national scale-up, needs for updating district WASH investment plans.
3. Evaluation Objectives
3.1 Overall objective
To assess the application, institutionalization, results and need for adjustments of the District-Wide Approach and district WASH investment plans in rural districts in Rwanda, and to propose an actionable framework for their improvement, updating, and financing.
3.2 Specific objectives
- Assess the extent to which the DWA has improved coordination, accountability, evidence use, prioritisation, financing and resource mobilization at district and national levels.
- Assess the degree of district ownership of WASH investment plans and the extent to which they are actually used to guide planning, budgeting and investment decisions.
- Determine the extent to which investment-plan priorities have been integrated into District Development Strategies, annual action plans, Imihigo, budgets, procurement plans and partner portfolios.
- Assess progress in implementing planned investments and strengthening WASH services, including water, sanitation, hygiene, WASH in institutions and service-provider performance.
- Assess the application of full life-cycle costing and current financing practice, covering CapEx, CapManEx, OpEx and direct support expenditure, and identify financing gaps across these categories.
- Assess institutional, technical, financial, environmental and social sustainability, including the district's capacity to maintain, update and use WASH investment plans and underlying data.
- Compare results and implementation of DWA pathways across the original pilot, the 2020 Water For People and WaterAid supported cohort and the Isoko y'Ubuzima-supported cohort, while accounting for overlap and contextual differences.
- Document the impact of the District-Wide Approach (DWA) on district WASH planning, financing, and access to WASH services across rural districts
- Produce prioritised, cost-conscious and institution-specific recommendations, together with a practical DWA improvement and institutionalisation roadmap.
4. Scope of the Evaluation
4.1 Geographic and programme scope
The evaluation scope will comprise all 27 districts in Rwanda covered by the DWA implementation.
4.2 Period of review
The evaluation shall cover the DWA journey from adoption in 2016 through the latest complete evidence available at the start of the consultancy. The consultant shall explicitly distinguish conditions at plan preparation, implementation milestones, current status and plausible post-project continuation.
4.3 Thematic scope
- DWA introduction, leadership, governance and stakeholder coordination.
- Baseline and periodic assessment of WASH service levels, assets, water resources, service-provider and institutional capacity.
- Vision, targets, prioritisation, scenarios and theory of change.
- Full life-cycle costing and financing-gap analysis.
- Quality and implementation readiness of engineering studies and project pipelines.
- Integration of water, sanitation, hygiene, climate resilience, inclusion and WASH in schools, health-care facilities and public places.
- Investment-plan approval, ownership, dissemination, use, updating.
- Implementation progress, procurement, financing, budget execution and partner alignment.
- Adoption of DWA principles by district WASH partners and collaborations
4.5 Implementation, financing and results
- Proportion and value of priority interventions initiated, completed, deferred, redesigned or unfunded, where reliable data permit.
- Sources, additionality and predictability of funds mobilized against WASH investment plan priorities.
- Alignment of district budgets and district stakeholders' financing with the plan.
- Changes in service access, functionality, reliability, quality, affordability and sustainability, with contribution rather than unsupported attribution.
5. Evaluation Framework and Key Questions
The consultant shall refine the questions and indicators during inception without weakening the minimum scope below.
| Evaluation lens | Minimum questions |
|---|---|
| DWA fidelity and adaptation | Which expected DWA steps were completed, partially completed, omitted or adapted? Were adaptations justified and documented? Did the process remain district-wide, evidence-based, participatory, iterative and focused on universal and sustainable services? |
| Relevance | Do DWA principles and plans respond to current district needs, national policy priorities, decentralization arrangements and service-delivery realities? |
| Coherence | How well are plans aligned with DDS, Imihigo, national sector plans, WASH MIS, WASAC investment programming, regulatory requirements, catchment or settlement plans and partner portfolios? Are mandates and planning instruments mutually reinforcing? |
| Effectiveness | To what extent were planned outputs, institutional changes, investment pipelines and financing objectives achieved? Which mechanisms, capacities and contextual factors explain variation? |
| Efficiency and value for money | Were planning resources, technical assistance and engineering inputs proportionate to the usefulness and implementation of the plans? Could standard costs, staged designs, digital data or alternative methods reduce cost and delay without reducing quality? |
| Impact and contribution | What positive or negative, intended or unintended changes in investment decisions, financing, service delivery, accountability, institutional behaviour and community outcomes can plausibly be linked to DWA? What alternative explanations exist? |
| Sustainability | Are governance arrangements, skills, data systems, funding and maintenance mechanisms likely to continue? Are plans updated, funded and used without project facilitation? Are recurrent and capital-maintenance needs addressed? |
| Equity and inclusion | Whose needs and voices shaped priorities? How are underserved settlements, low-income households, people with disabilities, women, schools, health facilities and climate-vulnerable communities reflected in plans and implementation? |
| Learning and scale | What should be retained, revised, discontinued or standardised? What minimum package, update cycle, data architecture, quality-assurance process and support model should guide future use? |
6. Methodology
6.1 Overall design
The consultant shall use a theory-based, utilisation-focused, mixed-methods and comparative design. The design shall reconstruct the DWA theory of change and test contribution pathways from DWA inputs and processes to plan quality, institutional behaviour, financing, implementation and WASH outcomes. A contribution-analysis approach shall be used because DWA operates within a complex sector and many outcomes have multiple causes.
6.2 Detailed methodology
- Comprehensive desk review and evidence inventory covering all districts in the verified evaluation universe.
- Reconstruction of the DWA theory of change, assumptions, risks and expected causal pathways.
- District investment-plan quality assessment using a standard scoring rubric developed and agreed at inception.
- Plan-to-budget-to-implementation tracing for a sample of priority interventions in every fieldwork district.
- Key informant interviews at national, district, utility, regulatory, service-provider and partner levels.
- Focus group discussions or structured community consultations, disaggregated where appropriate and safely feasible.
- Site verification of a purposive sample of implemented, partially implemented and non-implemented investment-plan priorities.
- Comparative case studies, including at least one stronger-performing and one weaker-performing pathway in each implementation wave.
- Validation and sense-making sessions at district and national levels.
6.3 Quality standards
- Methodological transparency and traceability of evidence.
- Triangulation and explicit grading of evidence strength.
- Factual accuracy and clear treatment of uncertainty and limitations.
- No unsupported causal claims or district rankings.
- Actionable recommendations linked directly to findings.
- Clear, concise and accessible writing suitable for policy, technical and district audiences.
7. Expected Deliverables
| Deliverable | Minimum content | Timing | Format/acceptance |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Inception report | Understanding of assignment; verified district universe and plan inventory; reconstructed theory of change; refined questions; methodology; sampling; instruments; data protocol; ethics; quality assurance; workplan; limitations and mitigation. | 5 working days after contract start | Technical Steering Committee approval |
| 2. Evidence inventory and plan-quality database | District-by-district inventory of plan versions, assessments, datasets, budgets, projects and evidence gaps; completed scoring rubric and metadata. | With inception updates and before fieldwork | Electronic, editable format |
| 3. Fieldwork completion brief | Coverage achieved, deviations, emerging issues, data-quality concerns and corrective actions. | Immediately after fieldwork | Brief note and debrief |
| 4. Preliminary findings package | Evidence-based findings by criterion and cohort; contribution pathways; comparative cases; initial recommendations; unresolved questions. | After analysis | Slide deck plus evidence matrix |
| 5. Draft evaluation report | Full report with executive summary, methodology, limitations, findings, conclusions, recommendations, district typology, a full diagnostic report presenting the overall findings, lessons learned, and recommendations. | As agreed in approved workplan | Maximum 80 pages excluding annexes |
| 6. Validation workshop | Facilitation materials, presentation, response log and documented decisions on factual corrections versus evaluative judgement. | Following draft review | Workshop package |
| 7. Final evaluation report and products |
Final report,
|
After consolidated comments | Word, PDF, PowerPoint and editable data formats |
8. Management, Governance and Quality Assurance
The assignment will be supervised by MININFRA under the WASH Sector Secretariat Coordinator and the Senior WASH Advocacy and Financing Manager in Water For People. This consultancy will receive financial support from Water For People. The consultant shall receive one consolidated set of comments per deliverable to be submitted by the WASH Sector Secretariat Coordinator.
The consultant should conduct consultations with the following stakeholders, but not limited to:
- Government Institutions: MININFRA, MINALOC, MINECOFIN, MINEDUC, MoH, WASAC, LODA, RWB
- Development partners, United Nations agencies, international financial institutions and bilateral cooperation partners (AfDB, JICA, UNICEF, WHO, U.S. Embassy, UNDP, GIZ, KfW, GGGI)
- National and international NGOs, civil society organizations and networks (Water For People, WaterAid, World Vision, MLFM, Riva Rwanda/IRC; Living Water International).
- Private water and sanitation service providers, professional associations and private-sector representatives (FEPEAR, ASSERWA, Water Access Rwanda and PSF)
- Universities, research institutions and organizations presenting relevant WASH studies or innovations.
9. Duration and Indicative Level of Effort
The assignment is expected to be completed within an indicative period of 20 days distributed over two months. Bidders shall propose a realistic schedule and level of effort consistent with the final district universe, sampling design and field coverage. The indicative sequencing below may be refined at inception.
| Phase | Indicative cumulative timing |
|---|---|
| Mobilisation, document inventory and inception | 5 days |
| Desk review, plan scoring and instrument finalisation | 2 days |
| Primary data collection and site verification | 7 days |
| Analysis, comparative case studies and preliminary findings | 2 days |
| Drafting and technical review | 2 days |
| Validation, revision and final products | 2 days |
| Total | 20 days |
10. Consultant Qualifications
The consultant should have the following qualifications:
- A Master's degree in water engineering, environmental health, public health, public policy, economics, development evaluation, or a closely related field, and at least 10 years of relevant professional experience.
- Demonstrated leadership of complex, multi-district or national evaluations using mixed methods and theory-based evaluation by presenting two approved reports similar to the assignment developed by the consultant in the previous 10 years.
- Deep expertise in WASH systems strengthening, decentralized service delivery, district planning and institutional analysis demonstrated by 10 years of experience in the WASH sector, evidenced by work completion certificates from relevant institutions.
- Expertise in public finance, full life-cycle costing, investment planning, value-for-money and financing-gap analysis.
- Technical expertise in rural and urban water service delivery, asset management, O&M, capital maintenance, engineering design and service-provider performance.
- Expertise in sanitation, hygiene, market-based sanitation and WASH in institutions.
- Strong quantitative, qualitative, sampling, data-management and data-visualization skills.
- Demonstrated experience in Rwanda or strong knowledge of Rwanda's decentralized governance and WASH institutional context.
- Excellent written and spoken English; capacity to conduct fieldwork in Kinyarwanda is required within the team.
- Ability to produce high-quality policy, technical and presentation products.
11. Proposal Submission Requirements
Technical proposals shall include:
- Interpretation of the assignment and critical evaluation of issues.
- Detailed methodology, theory-based design, sampling and analysis plan.
- Approach to district-universe reconciliation, plan scoring, contribution analysis, value-for-money and data-quality assessment.
- Workplan, staffing schedule and level of effort by expert.
- Quality-assurance, ethics, safeguarding and data-protection arrangements.
- At least two examples of relevant evaluation reports or products.
- Risk register and mitigation measures.
The financial proposal shall be itemised by professional fees, travel and fieldwork, workshops, data collection, taxes and other reimbursable costs, with assumptions clearly stated.
12. Evaluation of Proposals
| # | CRITERIA/ SUB-CRITERIA | SCORE RATE |
| A | 1. Profile of the Consultant | 40 |
| 1 | Master's degree in water engineering, environmental health, public health, public policy, economics, development evaluation, or a closely related field, and at least 10 years of relevant professional experience. (CV and copies of academic certificates). | 10 |
| 2 | Deep expertise in WASH systems strengthening, decentralized service delivery, district planning and institutional analysis demonstrated by 10 years of experience in the WASH sector (CV). | 10 |
| 3 | At least two completion certificates in a similar assignment, attached with sample reports approved by respective clients. | 20 |
| B | Understanding of the assignment and relevance of the proposed methodology | 60 |
| 5 | A detailed methodology demonstrating the understanding of the assignment, analytical rigor, sampling methods, data quality and ethics, CVs and tasks of personnel or team composition if needed. | 50 |
| Detailed workplan | 10 | |
| TOTAL | 100 |
13. Ownership, Confidentiality and Use of Outputs
All deliverables, instruments, databases, transcripts, photographs and other materials produced under the assignment shall become the property of MININFRA, subject to applicable law and contractual provisions. The consultant shall not publish, share or reuse identifiable information or assignment outputs without written authorisation. Final datasets shall be cleaned, documented, anonymised and delivered in editable formats.
14. Financial evaluation
Following the technical evaluation, only bidders who score 80% or higher will advance to the financial evaluation stage. At this stage, financial proposals will be assessed, and the bidder with the lowest price will be selected. Financial proposals must be password-protected, and passwords will only be requested from bidders who qualify for the financial evaluation.
Note: Any arithmetic error in the financial report will result in an automatic disqualification.
The selected bidder will be contractually required to comply with Water For People’s Vendor Code of Conduct https://www.waterforpeople.org/Vendor-Code-of-Conduct and will be required to deliver a Conflict-of-Interest Certificate before execution of the contract. The Conflict-of-Interest Certificate requires the disclosure of any potential or actual conflicts of interest with Water For People employees or their relatives, including past, current, or proposed business transactions, employment or offers of employment, or certain gifts or entertainment. Water For People will evaluate any disclosures of conflicts of interest; if Water For People determines it cannot waive or mitigate the conflict of interest, it will result in the disqualification of the selected proposer.
15. Copyrights
Copyright of all material on assignment will be retained by Water For People in Rwanda.
16. Rights reserved
- Water For People reserves the right to cancel the entire procurement process without incurring any liability whatsoever.
- Water For People reserves the right to amend any segment of the ToRs before the announcement of selected candidates.
- Water For People also reserves the right to remove one or more of the services from consideration for this contract should the evaluation show that it is in WFP’s best interest to do so.
- Water For People also may, at its discretion, issue a separate contract for any service or groups of services included in these ToRs. Water For People may negotiate a compensation package and additional provisions to the contract awarded under these ToRs.
- Water For People reserves the right to debrief the applicants after the completion of the process due to the expected high volume of applications to avoid the compromise of the process.
17. How to apply
If you feel qualified and interested in the assignment, please send your documents (including the technical and financial proposals as two separate attachments in a single e-mail) to: rwprocurement@waterforpeople.org no later than 13th September 2026 with the following subject: “Consultancy Services for the Evaluation of the District-Wide Approach for Sustainable WASH Services in Rwanda”.
Done at Kigali, on September 4th, 2026
Eugene DUSINGIZUMUREMYI
Country Director