Request for Proposal (RFP) for a firm to Design and Conduct Surveys to Gauge Stakeholder Perception and Attitudes towards Policy Change

Final Proposal Submission Deadline: Thursday 11th September 2025, 5pm PKT

Terms of Reference

Task Background

The Revenue Mobilisation, Investment and Trade (REMIT) is a multi-year (2021 – 2028) program funded by the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and is implemented by Adam Smith International (ASI). The program provides technical assistance (TA) to Pakistan with a broader objective to implement reforms for strengthening macroeconomic stability and improving conditions for high and sustained growth, mutual prosperity, job creation, and poverty reduction. The Programme works towards supporting the Government of Pakistan, its relevant ministries, institutions, and departments to strengthen revenue mobilization reforms/initiatives, address investment environment challenges, facilitate trade and drive competitiveness by reducing trade barriers, and improve the macroeconomic policy and its management.

One major area of support is the National Fiscal Pact (NFP), a reform designed to rebalance federal and provincial expenditures in line with the 18th Constitutional Amendment and Pakistan’s IMF program. The NFP involves devolving federal activities and increasing provincial spending on education, health, social protection, and infrastructure. REMIT has already conducted fiscal modelling and policy simulations to identify devolution pathways. The next phase requires public policy experimentation, testing how different communication materials, narratives, and evidence-based inputs affect perceptions and readiness among policy stakeholders.

The survey firm will support this effort by designing and implementing baseline, midline, and endline surveys, capturing knowledge, attitudes, and practices of key groups: primarily public officials (current serving civil servants across the provinces), and secondarily academics, and media. This data will underpin randomized or quasi-experimental interventions to test what works in shifting beliefs and building momentum for reform.

Objectives of the Assignment

The objectives of the assignment are as follows:

• Establish baseline Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices (KAP) of key stakeholders on NFP, debt management, and climate budgeting reforms.

• Disseminate different analytic materials and narratives to stakeholders to test how exposure shifts attitudes.

• Collect robust quantitative and qualitative data to measure treatment effects.

• Generate midline and endline evidence to guide government communication and reform engagement strategies.

• The sample size is expected to be a minimum of 500 individuals.

Scope

Survey Firm Responsibilities

The scope of work for the Quality Assurance entails the following:

• Collaborate with REMIT experts to define key stakeholders for the survey.

• Oversee pilot surveys to refine questionnaires and methodology before full rollout.

• Ensure adherence to data privacy laws and ethical guidelines (e.g., informed consent, anonymization).

• Conduct spot checks, back-checks, and geo-tracking to prevent fraud/misreporting.

• Address logistical challenges (e.g., security, access to respondents) in coordination with governmental agencies.

• Supervise removal of duplicates, outliers, and inconsistencies in raw data.

• Facilitate focus groups with with governmental counterparts to validate preliminary results.

• Identify and mitigate potential biases (e.g., non-response, sampling errors).

Brief Description of Activities

The assignment will involve the following activities:

• Survey Design and Development: Ensure a robust and comprehensive questionnaire captures all necessary data to address the objectives of subject studies.

• Sample Selection: Identify a sample representative of different stakeholders and target groups across Pakistan. Statistical methods can be used to determine an appropriate sample size that ensures the results are statistically significant

• Data Collection: Administer the survey through on-field presence and visits and data collected on digital devices. Field protocol must be defined before the survey to ensure best practices.

• Dissemination of Communication: Disseminate the communication materials to stakeholders, ensuring compliance with the design of the intervention.

• Data Analysis: Clean and analyse the data using statistical tools to draw meaningful insights.

• Report Writing: Compile a comprehensive report detailing the study’s findings. The report should clearly present the methodology, data analysis, key insights, and potential implications and recommendation for custom and trade policies.

Key deliverables and timelines

Qualifications and Experience

The selected Survey Firm should have the following capabilities:

• The firm should have a minimum of 10 years of experience in the carrying out surveys with civil servants, academics, and media personnel in Pakistan. The leadership staff and management staff must have relevant experience and qualifications to deliver the contract, with a special focus on experienced enumerators with proficiency in English and local languages, and experienced questionnaire and data management specialists and data analysts with excellent report writing skills.

• The firm should have the ability to understand the requirements and scope of surveys and shall provide excellent customer service throughout the duration of the contract. The firm, in its technical proposal should be able to demonstrate the capacity and skillset for carrying out this work and also demonstrate the ability /previous experience to manage data ethically and responsibly.

• Previous work with government personnel and institutions is a significant advantage.

• Some key core competencies, which should be demonstrated in the proposal, required for the firm are:

• Organization and collaboration- Ability to work well in collaborative environments with the ability to plan for and execute effectively, including the ability to communicate with and work in collaboration with relevant government ministries, whenever required.

• Documents and translations- Ability to prepare work-plan documents with checks for data quality, according to agreed upon data management protocols and ensure timely high quality data collection. Demonstrated ability to ensure the safekeeping of all project data, including but not limited to transportation, storage, communication, and analysis.

• Logistics, Administration & Ethics – Ability to mobilise survey staff and ensure availability of resources, including transportation and other requirements. Ability to handle any emergencies if they arise, actively participate in regular meetings with the REMIT and governmental counterparts with active consulting on plan / methodology / timeframe. etc. Ensure data management, confidentiality and security and seek No Objective Certificates from administration wherever needed.

• Ability to hire domain experts specific to the project meant to quality assure the survey design and delivery through technical domain knowledge

Bidders should examine all Instructions, Terms and Conditions as given in the RFP. Failure to furnish information required in the RFP or submission of Bids not substantially responsive or viable in every respect will be at the Bidder’s risk and may result in rejection of the bids. Bidders should strictly submit the Bid as specified in the RFP, failing which the bids will be held as non-responsive and will be rejected.

Bids shall compromise a single package containing two folders:

Bidders should send soft copies of the Technical and Financial Proposal to the following address:

Soft copies to be sent to: recruitment.remit@adamsmithinternational.com

Proposal Weightings

Prospective firms must be legally registered under the laws of the country in which they are organized and possess all licenses, permits and government approvals necessary for performance of the work.

Prospective contractors are responsible for understanding the solicitation in its entirety and each of its elements and should make inquiries to ASI as necessary to ensure such understanding. ASI reserves the right to disqualify any prospective vendor that it determines, at its sole discretion, does not understand the solicitation or any of its elements. Such disqualification shall be at no fault, cost, or liability whatsoever to ASI.

All information provided by ASI in this solicitation is subject to change at any time. ASI makes no certification as to the accuracy of any item and is not responsible or liable for any use of or reliance on the information or for any claims asserted therefrom.

All communications related to the RFP must be in writing via email to the above-mentioned point of contact.

• Questions concerning this solicitation must be submitted in writing to the contact person mentioned above.

• Errors and omissions in this solicitation, as well as enhancements. Prospective firms should notify ASI of any discrepancies, errors, or omissions that may exist within this solicitation. Prospective vendors should recommend to ASI any enhancements to the work described in the solicitation which might be in ASI’ best interests.

• Inquiries about technical interpretations must be directly asked from contact person (Alex Harris).

ASI reserves the right to require the prospective firms to enter into a non-disclosure agreement.

Collusion is strictly prohibited. Collusion is defined as an agreement or compact, written or oral, between two or more parties with the goal of limiting fair and open competition by deceiving, misleading, or defrauding a third party.

The prospective vendor must disclose in writing with its Response if a government, its agents, or agencies, have an ownership or managerial interest in the company. Failure to disclose a government ownership of managerial interest in the company will result in the prospective contractor’s offer being removed from consideration.

The prospective contractor must disclose in writing with its Response any subcontracting that will take place under an award. Failure to disclose subcontracting relationships will result in the prospective contractor’s offer being removed from consideration. (if permitted by the solicitation)

The solicitation does not obligate ASI to pay for any costs, of any kind whatsoever, which may be incurred by a prospective contractor/vendor or third parties, in connection with the Response.

Prospective vendors may not use any intellectual property of ASI including, but not limited to, all logos, trademarks, or trade names of ASI, at any time without the prior written approval of ASI.

All accepted Responses shall become the property of ASI and will not be returned.

ASI reserves the right to accept all or part of the Response when awarding a contract.

ASI reserves the right to accept or reject any Response or to stop the procurement process at any time, without assigning any reason or liability. ASI shall not be liable to any prospective contractor, person, or entity for any losses, expenses, costs, claims, or damages of any kind.

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Bidders should examine all Instructions, Terms and Conditions as given in the RFP. Failure to furnish information required in the RFP or submission of Bids not substantially responsive or viable in every respect will be at the Bidder’s risk and may result in rejection of the bids. Bidders should strictly submit the Bid as specified in the RFP, failing which the bids will be held as non-responsive and will be rejected.

Bids shall compromise a single package containing two folders:

Bidders should send soft copies of the Technical and Financial Proposal to the following address:

Soft copies to be sent to: recruitment.remit@adamsmithinternational.com