What should a RAP terms of reference specify?

The applicable standards, the geographic scope including associated facilities, the census instrument's structural requirements, the valuation approach with a replacement-cost benchmark, the socioeconomic baseline built around named monitoring indicators, team composition expressed in person-days rather than titles, data deliverables with the audit trail intact and ownership vesting in the client, and testable acceptance criteria.

What is the single most important clause?

The milestone structure. A census cannot begin until the footprint is fixed, and where the terms of reference schedule enumeration before the design is frozen, re-enumeration and re-valuation are already priced in. Making the census milestone conditional on written footprint confirmation, and treating later design change as a variation, prevents more cost than any other clause.

Why specify person-days rather than just key experts?

Because a named specialist can be listed on a bid and provide three days of input. Field time for the sociologist is what gets compressed when the schedule slips, and social analysis thins out precisely where the risk sits. Minimum field days per role, plus an enumerator-to-household ratio and a supervision arrangement, are what actually determine the quality of what you receive.

How should data deliverables be specified?

As a system the client holds, in an agreed structure and open format, with the change history intact and ownership vesting in the client. Where the register lives in the consultant's systems and is handed over as a final file, the implementing agency inherits a dataset it did not build and cannot query, without the people who know its exceptions — and the completion audit then tests a record nobody in the room maintained.

How much should a RAP consultancy cost?

It scales with the number of parcels to enumerate and the terrain, not with corridor length. Terms of reference that estimate from length systematically underestimate in fragmented smallholder areas, and the resulting bids solve the problem by doing less enumeration — which surfaces two years later as an inadequate baseline that cannot be fixed.

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Terms of Reference Template for a RAP Consultancy

A clause-by-clause TOR structure for procuring a Resettlement Action Plan — 24 clauses, what to specify in each, and what it costs you if the clause is left out.

24 clauses · what to specify · consequence if omitted

Most weaknesses in a RAP were procured, not drafted

A capable team working to a weak terms of reference produces a document that satisfies the terms of reference. The scope, the milestone structure, the team composition and the deliverable definitions determine what the consultant can produce — and all four are fixed months before anyone mobilises.

Which is why the highest-leverage hour available to a project sponsor is spent on this document rather than on reviewing the draft plan that eventually arrives.

The clause nobody thinks of as a resettlement clause

The milestone structure. A RAP cannot enumerate until the footprint is known, and the footprint is an output of the impact assessment's alternatives analysis — where the number of people displaced is meant to be one of the criteria for choosing the route.

Where the terms of reference require census delivery on a date that precedes footprint confirmation, they have commissioned enumeration against assumptions. Every assumption that turns out wrong is re-surveying, re-valuation and re-consultation, paid for twice — and the bidder who understood this priced the risk in, so the project pays either way.

Specify the instrument, not just the report

A TOR asking for a RAP in accordance with applicable standards leaves every methodological decision to the bidder, and bidders differ. Four requirements are worth writing in explicitly, because none of them happens by default:

A census instrument that supports multiple claims per parcel and records individuals within households. Without it, tenants, sharecroppers and adult dependants are unrepresentable.
A replacement-cost benchmark against any statutory rate schedule, with the gap documented and the bridging method stated.
A seasonal common-property use survey as a required component. If it is not required it will not be done, and the matrix will have no row for grazing or firewood.
A socioeconomic baseline designed around the monitoring indicators, which the TOR names. Everything the monitoring framework will later need has to be collected at baseline, and this is the last point at which it can be required.

Say what happens after approval

The default is that the plan is accepted, the team disperses, and the implementing agency begins a multi-year programme with a document and no institutional memory. Extending the same team into implementation support, or requiring a documented handover with a defined overlap, costs a fraction of what re-learning the dataset costs — and it is a clause, not a negotiation, if it is in the terms of reference.

Questions

What should a RAP terms of reference specify?: The applicable standards, the geographic scope including associated facilities, the census instrument's structural requirements, the valuation approach with a replacement-cost benchmark, the socioeconomic baseline built around named monitoring indicators, team composition expressed in person-days rather than titles, data deliverables with the audit trail intact and ownership vesting in the client, and testable acceptance criteria.
What is the single most important clause?: The milestone structure. A census cannot begin until the footprint is fixed, and where the terms of reference schedule enumeration before the design is frozen, re-enumeration and re-valuation are already priced in. Making the census milestone conditional on written footprint confirmation, and treating later design change as a variation, prevents more cost than any other clause.
Why specify person-days rather than just key experts?: Because a named specialist can be listed on a bid and provide three days of input. Field time for the sociologist is what gets compressed when the schedule slips, and social analysis thins out precisely where the risk sits. Minimum field days per role, plus an enumerator-to-household ratio and a supervision arrangement, are what actually determine the quality of what you receive.
How should data deliverables be specified?: As a system the client holds, in an agreed structure and open format, with the change history intact and ownership vesting in the client. Where the register lives in the consultant's systems and is handed over as a final file, the implementing agency inherits a dataset it did not build and cannot query, without the people who know its exceptions — and the completion audit then tests a record nobody in the room maintained.
How much should a RAP consultancy cost?: It scales with the number of parcels to enumerate and the terrain, not with corridor length. Terms of reference that estimate from length systematically underestimate in fragmented smallholder areas, and the resulting bids solve the problem by doing less enumeration — which surfaces two years later as an inadequate baseline that cannot be fixed.

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A template is a starting point. The version that survives a completion audit is one where every change is attributed to a person and a date, and where the numbers reconcile to what was actually paid.

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