Regional Contracting Office, USAID/Bolivia, Unit 3912, APO AA 34032

R -- COUNTER NARCOTICS CONSOLIDATION OF ALTERNATIVE DEVELOPMENT EFFORTS (CONCADE) SOL 511-99-001 DUE 111698 POC Gonzalo Zambrana, Negotiator, e-mail:gzambrana@usaid.gov; James J. Dunlap, Regional Contracting Officer, E-mail jdunlap@usaid.gov, Tel: 591-2-786445, Fax 591-2-785689, La Paz, Bolivia The U. S. Agency for International Development Mission to Bolivia (USAID/Bolivia) is seeking proposals from qualified organizations with significant alternative development, project implementation experience to provide a wide range of tropical agriculture-related services including technical assistance, extension (technology transfer), marketing, investment promotion, training, infrastructure development, information systems and policy analysis. The selected contractor will lead an approximately 4 year implementation of a market-led, results-driven counter-narcotics alternative development activity in the Chapare (a tropical region within the Government of Bolivia (GOB) Department of Cochabamba with fragile soils, humid climate, and rainfall ranging from 2,500-5,000 millimeters per year). CONCADE's objective is to transform the Chapare economy from the current mix of licit cultivation, coca production, processing and trafficking to a situation where illegal coca is eliminated. Given that up to 95 percent of the coca grown in the Chapare is used for illegal purposes, alternative development is a component of a larger USG-supported counter-narcotics program which emphasizes law enforcement and coca eradication. Based on the current agriculture and infrastructure network which already enables farmers to support themselves and their families without the need to cultivate coca, CONCADE expected results are the establishment of: sustainable licit domestic and foreign market demand, market linkages and farm-level production capacity leading to a drug-free Chapare by the end of year 2002. Building on experiences and gains achieved by USAID projects over the past two decades in the Chapare, CONCADE activity requires: a) a tight linkage of alternative development to coca elimination by conditioning assistance to farmer organizations who sign agreements to eliminate all of their coca or have all of their coca forcibly eradicated; b) the development of effective strategies to reduce subsidies of agriculture and infrastructure inputs; and c) to gradually graduate farmer organizations from activity assistance. The selected contractor will be required to work very closely with and/or provide implementation oversight to 4 GOB entities and an unidentified number of non-government organizations. Additionally, the contractor is expected to coordinate its efforts with a complimentary activity conducted by UNDCP/FAO in the area of agro-forestry or forestry. Proposals will be for what is expected to be a performance based contracting mechanism, perhaps with award fee provisions. The RFP is expected to be released approximately 15 days after this notice. To aid offerors in becoming acquainted with CONCADE activity and proposal requirements, a preproposal conference of about 5 working days length will be held which will include travel to La Paz, Cochabamba and the Chapare. The preferred method of distribution of USAID procurement information is via the Internet or by request of a solicitation on a 3.5" floppy disk (WordPerfect 5.1/5.2 format). This CBD notice can be viewed and downloaded using the Agency Web Site. The RFP, once issued, can be downloaded from the Agency web site. The Worldwide Web address is http://www.info.usaid.gov. Select Business and Procurement Opportunities from the home page, then "USAID Procurements." On the following screen, select "Download Available USAID Solicitations." Receipt of this RFP through INTERNET must be confirmed by written notification to the contact person noted above. It is the responsibility of the recipient of this solicitation document to ensure that it has been received from INTERNET in its entirety and USAID bears no responsibility for data errors resulting from transmission or conversion processes. Posted 09/03/98 (I-SN245669). (0246)

Loren Data Corp. http://www.ld.com (SYN# 0134 19980908\R-0009.SOL)