About SNV

SNV is a global development partner rooted in the African and Asian countries where we operate. With 60 years of experience and a team of approximately 1,600 people, its mission is to strengthen capacities and catalyse partnerships that transform the agri-food, energy, and water systems to enable sustainable and more equitable lives for all.

Background

The Youth Entrepreneurship in Agriculture in Rwanda (YEA-R) program’s goal is to enable 40,000 young women (70%) and men into dignified and equitable work opportunities in the Agrifood sector in Rwanda, thereby contributing to the Mastercard Foundation’s 2030 goal of creating 300,000 work opportunities for youth by 2030. This would be achieved by enabling inclusive market-led economic growth through enabled agricultural SMEs due to better-skilled youth. The YEA-R program will be implemented over five years, focusing on empowering youth between 18-35 years old with technical skills specific to the horticulture and poultry value chains. The program also provides life skills, entrepreneurship coaching, and mentorship to help young people thrive in these competitive sectors. The program is comprised of the following three interrelated key pathways:

• Strengthened production and resilience: Equip young people with industry-relevant skills that will enable them to successfully run and grow businesses in increasingly competitive poultry and horticulture subsectors
• Strengthened businesses & improved market linkages and financial services: Identify opportunities for young women and men to become self-employed/business owners in the Agrifood sector. It will also facilitate market access arrangements between growers, buyers, and Value Chain businesses and promote inclusive business practices by VC stakeholders.
• Empowerment, Voice & Agency: The program through gender, equity and social inclusion GESI embedded approach will equip and empower young women, men and people with disabilities (PWDs) with life skills, business mentorship, confidence and agency so that they can influence the value chain actors as well as running successful businesses.

In its inception phase, the YEA-R project undertook a comprehensive approach to identify barriers limiting youth access to dignified and fulfilling work opportunities in the horticulture and poultry value chains. This included conducting feasibility study, reviewing relevant literature, and facilitating high-level public-private dialogues and co-creation sessions with key market actors. These efforts provided critical insights into systemic challenges and informed the project's strategic direction to enhance youth engagement and opportunities in these sub sectors.

The Youth entrepreneurship in Agriculture -Rwanda program recognizes that digitalization plays a transformative role in enhancing youth inclusion in agriculture especially women and young people with mobility or hearing impairments access information remotely and inclusively through customized digital solutions. Leveraging digitalization, youth participants can have. 

• Access to agricultural Knowledge and Skills: Digital platforms like mobile based apps, e-laccearning tools, and SMS-based advisory services provide easy access to agricultural knowledge. This helps Youths learn modern farming techniques like climate smart agriculture and other yield enhancing practices, pest and disease management, and post-harvest handling. More importantly, women who are busy with unpaid home care tasks and PWDs, especially those with mobility or hearing impairments access information remotely and inclusively through customized digital solutions.
• Enhanced Market Access and Financial Inclusion: E-commerce and digital market platforms link youth groups and youth owned MSMEs with mobility challenges like women and people with disabilities to input suppliers, and buyers to access reliable markets for their produces, and financial institutions to be able to transact independently, build credit profiles, and access to external loans without physical participation or travel.
• Work opportunities: Digitalization enables youths particularly Women and PWDs to dive into dignified and equitable work opportunities such as digital extension agents and content creators and other opportunities emerging from Agri-digital business models thereby reducing gender and mobility related barriers in rural areas.

In this context, the feasibility study findings and other assessments conducted by YEA-R revealed that many youth groups including youth owned MSMEs within the project zone of intervention face significant challenges in accessing and utilizing existing innovative digital solutions. These include limited engagement with inclusive digital training materials, digital marketplaces, and digital financial services. As a result, persistent gaps remain in entrepreneurship and business management (skills development), supply chain integration (market access), and access to inclusive agricultural financing. These barriers hinder the ability of youth mainly young women and youth with disabilities to scale and sustain agribusiness ventures, limiting their potential to compete and unlock more dignified work opportunities in the horticulture and poultry value chains.

General Objective

The general objective of this call for Expression of Interest (EOI) is to identify and engage Agri-Tech enterprises with digital platforms capable of delivering tailored and targeted digital solutions to YEA-R participants (Youth groups and Youth-led or and youth-owned MSMEs) as well as other targeted actors across the horticulture and poultry value chains.

Interested and qualified enterprises or organizations are invited to submit their Expression of Interest for one or more of the following lots:

Lot 1: Development of inclusive digital training materials to enhance skills in agricultural production and business management.

Lot 2: Digital marketplace solutions to facilitate market linkages, address asymmetric market information, and support other online transactions.

Lot 3:Digital financial services for youth groups operations including savings and internal lending, credit scoring profiles and linkage to financial institutions for accessing formal external loans.

General Scope of Work

The YEA-R program believes that agriculture remains the cornerstone of Rwanda’s economy, presents significant opportunities for creating work opportunities for youth if effectively integrated with digital solutions. Digital innovations hold the potential to transform agricultural value chains by enhancing skills development needed to increase productivity, driving business growth, and improving market access and financial inclusion for unbanked young people, particularly young women and youth with disabilities in rural areas.

The YEA-R program also recognizes the need for tailored and suitable digital business models that deliver high-quality, proximity-based services addressing the specific needs of project participants and youth owned MSMEs to overcome the challenges highlighted above.

Accordingly, successful service providers will be requested to design and implement customized digital services for YEA-R participants (hereafter referred to as ‘target groups’) which will be outlined in the work order (WO) assignments. 

Location and targeted Participants

In the first year, the requested services will be implemented in one or more of the following six districts: Burera, Musanze, Rutsiro, Karongi, Nyamasheke, and Muhanga, with the possibility of scaling successful models to other districts in the subsequent years of the project.

The target participants include, but are not limited to, youth groups, youth cooperatives, youth-led businesses, and youth-owned MSMEs within the horticulture and poultry value chains.

Evaluation Methodology and Criteria

A) Eligibility criteria

1. Legal Registration: The applicant must be a legally registered firm in Rwanda. A valid business license or registration certificate and a valid tax clearance certificate are required.
2. Relevant Experience: The applicant must have a minimum of five (5) years of experience working with various stakeholders, including NGOs, civil society organizations, public and private institutions, in the areas relevant to the selected lot(s). Possession of completion certificates or proof of successful delivery of similar previous assignments will be considered as an added value.

iii. Digital readiness: The applicant must possess fully developed digital tools or technologies relevant to the selected lot. Where applicable, any prior readiness trials, pilot implementations, or demonstrations of the tool’s functionality should be clearly specified and documented in the application.

Note: For applicants applying under Lot 3 (Digital Financial Services), possession of a valid Digital Saving Facilitator (DSF) license issued by the National Bank of Rwanda (NBR) is mandatory. Holding a Micro-Lending (NDFI) license will be considered a strong added advantage.

b) Evaluation Methodology

SNV will apply a Weighted Trade-Off evaluation methodology for this solicitation. This approach selects the offeror(s) providing the best overall value by considering technical factors based on assigned weights outlined in the evaluation criteria. The Technical Evaluation Committee (TEC) will assess the acceptability of offers according to the following criteria:

Offer Format Instructions

Offers submitted in response to this solicitation must comply with the following instructions. A complete offer must include all the following documents:

• Submissions will be accepted in the following language(s): English.
• Each page of the submitted offer must include the following in the footer:
• Offeror name
• Solicitation title and reference number

Completed Inputs as per the attached annexes:

• Annex I: Offer letter Template
• Annex II: Technical Proposal Template
• Copy of the Offeror’s Business License or Registration Certificate(s) (E.g.: RGB registration certificate, BNR Licences, ....)
• Valid RRA Tax Clearance Certificate.
• CVs for All Key Personnel: Maximum of three (3) pages per CV

Application

The interested and qualified firms or Applicants should submit their applications to rwandaprocurement@snv.orgno later than July 20, 2025, 5:00 PM Rwanda time. highlighting their understanding of the assignment, proposed daily rates and the total costs including the taxes, excluding any expenses related to workshop costs, transport, participants’ accommodation, etc. will be covered by YEA-R project separately. Recent CVs of the team members, highlighting qualifications and experience, including similar assignments carried out in the past must be submitted with the Letter of Interest.

NB: Only selected service providers with innovative digital solutions will be contacted.

We do not appreciate third-party mediation based on this advertisement. 

Key compliance issues

Consultant must comply with SNV’s environmental and Social Safeguarding policies and procedures as well as take into consideration donor-specific requirements.

Data Protection assurance

SNV will not retain your Personal Data for longer than is allowed by law or is necessary for the Purposes.

If you are selected and offered employment, the Personal Data you have provided will be used by SNV for the purpose of this bidding administration. If you are unsuccessful on this occasion to secure tender with SNV, SNV will retain your Personal Data.