1. Development of governance systems in the South Russian regions has been recognized as one of the priority objectives. Based on diagnostic studies performed by the World Bank upon request of the RF Presidential Plenipotentiary in the Southern Federal Okrug the draft Medium-Term Action Plan for Strengthening Governance in the South Russian regions was prepared and presented to the RF Presidential Plenipotentiary and Heads of the RF subjects of SFO at the meeting of the Council of Heads of the SFO subjects held on July, 8, 2005 in Nalchik. A decision to set up a Working Group for Coordinating Activities in the Area of Strengthen-ing Governance in the South Russian Regions (Working Group) was made at that meeting. At the first meeting of the Working Group the package of documents regulated the structure, authorities of the Working Group, responsibilities of Secretariat for Working Group, as well as the Working Program for developing governance systems in the South Russian regions for September 2005 - March 2006 was adopted.The Working Program for the period from March to December 2008 was adopted during the last meeting of the Working Group held on March 17, 2008.  

2. The aim of Consultants under this assignment is to support the Working Group's activity in the area of co-ordinating projects financed by donor organizations and designed for governance strengthening in the Southern Russian regions. Besides, this assignment envisages support through interregional experience exchange events, as well as policy advice to the Apparatus of the Presidential Plenipotentiary in the Southern Federal Okrug and monitoring of the Medium-Term Action Plan progress.

3. A group of Consultants under this assignment will constitute Donor coordination Unit ( the Secretariat for  the Working Group).

4. The aim of this assignment is provision of continuous support to public administration development in the South Russian regions through (1) coordination of donor-funded projects; (2) provision of policy advice to the Working Group members on the issues related to strengthening governance systems; (3) progress monitoring of the Medium-Term Action Plan for Strengthening Governance in the South Russian regions; and (4) organizing interregional capacity building and experience exchange activities in the area of state governance.

5. Therefore, the main objectives of Donor Coordination Unit are:

    - Provide coordination and organizational support to the activities in the area of strengthening governance systems in the South Russian regions in the frames of cooperation with international financial organizations and donor organizations;

    - Develop, maintain and upgrade the Working Group's web-site and dissemination of information on the work progress in the area of strengthening governance in the South Russian regions;

   - Execute the functions of information resource centre of relevant materials on strengthening governance in the South Russian regions;

   - Maintain a pool of local experts in the area of public administration development;

   - Prepare briefs, quick information notes on the project progress and conduct regular monitoring of governance systems status in the South Russian regions on the basis of statistic data, surveys carried out by the Apparatus of the Presidential Plenipotentiary in the Southern Federal Okrug (upon request of the Working Group);

   - Interaction with DFID and the World Bank Donor Secretariat on the issues related to information support of activities for strengthening governance in the South Russian regions;

    - Prepare quarterly progress reports on providing technical assistance and implementing joint projects in the area of strengthening governance in the South Russian regions;

    - Provide organizational support to interregional events (seminars, conferences) on the issues related to developing governance in the South Russian regions.

6. Donor Coordination Unit is supposed to provide liaison with the Apparatus of the Presidential Plenipotentiary in the Southern Federal Okrug, subjects of the Russian Federation within SFO, Association "North Cauca-sus" on various governance-related issues, preparation and implementation of joint projects.

7. To fulfill the project objectives the World Bank plans that the following individual consultants are hired to the Donor Coordination Unit: Head of DCU, Research Analyst, Interpreter/Translator and Secretary-Assistant. Besides, international consultants specializing in certain areas of governance reforms will be hired (on a short-term basis). The main tasks of the consultants are described below.

8. Tasks of DCU Head:

- Interaction with the Apparatus of the Presidential Plenipotentiary in the Southern Federal Okrug, representa-tives of the South Russian regions, Association "North Caucasus", donor organizations and their experts on the issues related to coordination of donor-funded projects in the area of public administration development, scheduling and arrangement of the international experts' visits, conducting interregional events, collecting data on the status of governance systems in the South Russian regions;

- Arrangement and planning of DCU activity;

- Support donor organizations experts' activity under the governance-related projects, participation in corre-sponding visits, etc.;

- Support the interregional activities;

- Collection and constant actualization of data related to technical assistance under donor-financed projects in the South of Russia and preparation of corresponding Summary Matrixes for coordination of donor projects;

- Preparation of reports on the Medium-Term Action Plan implementation (to be reviewed at the Working Group meetings) and progress reports under this Projects (to be submitted to the World Bank, European Union).

9. Tasks of Research Analyst:

- Preparation of informational and analytical materials related to public administration reforms upon requests of the Working Group (including joint activity with international experts);

- Participation in expert and donor meetings, as well as in donor missions (if required) related to public ad-ministration development projects in the South Russian regions;

- Establish the informational materials data base (resource centre) and expert pool;

- Conducting informational inquiries on the resource centre materials and providing responses, consultations, etc.;

- Participation in preparation of interregional seminars and other interregional events related to strengthening governance in the South Russian regions (interaction with organizations, support to agendas development, preparation of informational materials, conducting the events, etc.);

- Regular actualization of the Medium-Term Action Plan for Strengthening Governance in the South Russian regions (based on decisions made by the Working Group, carried out diagnostic surveys, etc.);

- Monitoring of the Medium-Term Action Plan progress and status of governance systems, including:

       * Analysis of statistic information;

      *Support the Apparatus of the Presidential Plenipotentiary in the Southern Federal Okrug on the issues of development and processing of governance-related questionnaires forwarded to the South Russian regions;

      * Policy advice on improvement of governance monitoring systems;

      * Support the surveys outputs' analyses in the area of governance systems in the South Russian regions;

      * Support DCU Head within preparation of information to be submitted to the World Bank and related to the project progress.

10. Tasks of Interpreter/Translator:

- Written translations from Russian into English and from English into Russian (upon requests of the Working Group, Head of DCU, Research Analyst);

- Interpretation during the meetings of international experts with Russian counterparts, and at interregional seminars, etc.;

- Translation and interpretation during the international expert missions on the issues of public administration development in the South Russian regions (except Dagestan and Republic of Chechnya).

11. Tasks of Secretary-Assistant:

- Maintain files and office work related to DCU activities;

- Support individual consultants-members of DCU;

- Conduct archive of the project;

- Provide support of the resource center web-site concerning state governance in the South Russian regions;

- Register information and other inquiries of users of the resource center, evaluate statistics of DCU activities;

- Provide support of the resource center web-site concerning state governance in the South Russian regions.