Terms of reference for FPIC project advocacy paper researcher(s)

a. Background

Three UK-based civil society organisations – Ecumenical Council for Corporate Responsibility, Indigenous Peoples Links, and the Missionary Society of St Columban – and one UK academic institution – Middlesex University Business School Law Department – have developed a joint advocacy project to promote the human rights of mining-affected Indigenous Peoples and address the wider economic, environmental, social and political costs to society of large-scale mining. The project will run from January 2012 to August 2014 and seeks to persuade leading multinational mining companies (that are UK listed) to adhere to existing international human rights standards and specifically to adopt and implement Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) as a new industry-wide policy and practice standard, as incorporated in the 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP).

The project partners will work in close consultation with Indigenous Peoples’ organisations in commissioning and publishing an advocacy paper on the issue. The project will be guided by these organisations in developing dialogue with target mining companies, institutional investors and fund managers, and state regulatory actors in pursuing company policy and practice change. The advocacy paper will start this process, with an initial focus on the mining companies.

We are therefore looking for one or more consultant researcher(s) to research and write the advocacy paper, working with the project partners and with guidance from an advisory group that will include representatives of Indigenous Peoples’ organisations.

b. Tasks and output

The researcher(s) will be responsible for researching, drafting and revising an advocacy paper in English as outlined in the project proposal (full proposal available on request):

Length: approx. 30 pages / 15,000 words, including recommendations (plus relevant appendices and references)

Content (provisional)
1. Executive summary
2. Introduction
3. FPIC standards, definitions and summary review of work to date (including a brief literature review)
4. Indigenous Peoples’ conceptions of FPIC
5. Critical assessment of policy and practice of target companies, focused on specific case studies. These could well include, but not be confined to:

Anglo American BHP Billiton Rio Tinto Xstrata

6. Review/examples of investor policy on Indigenous Peoples’ rights and FPIC
7. Addressing perceived implementation challenges for companies, and Indigenous Peoples e.g. addressing definitional issues; catering for diversity of Indigenous Peoples and within communities, including by gender; operationalisation where not required in national legislation etc.
8. What might good mining company practice look like?
9. Conclusions
10. Recommendations which will be focussed on companies, but may include any of the following:

To specific companies To the mining sector To investors and fund managers To other, e.g. state, actors

11. Sources and references

Gender: The advocacy paper will address gender as a cross-cutting issue and explore possibilities for obtaining data on mining’s gendered impacts on indigenous women and men, from an indigenous perspective.

The project partners understand that this will be an iterative process, and are open to suggestions regarding modifications to the paper’s structure and content.

Aside from the report, the researchers will be required to actively participate in verification and launch events as laid out below.

c. Methodology and work plan

The production of the advocacy paper will be a desk study carried out in close collaboration with the project partners, and with input from the advisory group. Source documents to be consulted will include, but not necessarily be limited to, relevant company reports and industry publications, key UN documents, papers already written on the subject (particularly by Indigenous Peoples and their supporters as well as internationally peer reviewed literature) and case studies written up from conferences or by communities. The research will also likely involve interviews with relevant mining industry employees, particularly to better understand their concerns around FPIC, as well as expert indigenous and academic commentators. It is intended that the project partners and advisory group will supply ideas and access to some of these materials, but others will be gathered by the researcher(s).

It is also expected that the researcher(s) will participate in seminars or meetings with experts, companies or investors where the findings and recommendations will be discussed. The project plan includes a launch event for the advocacy paper (around March or April 2013), which we expect researcher(s) would attend, to assist in the presentation of the paper’s findings and recommendations in London. There is budget for travel, which is intended for travel of indigenous activists and advisors that could be used to pay for researchers outside of London to travel to London-based meetings.

d. Form of contract, timetable and payment

The contract for this work will be in the form of a letter of agreement between the project partners and the commissioned researcher(s).

The timetable is envisaged as running from July 2012 to March 2013 (ten months) but may be altered by mutual agreement. This includes time for feedback from expert indigenous and academic commentators, ideally including seminars and/or meetings.

The researcher(s) will submit a draft paper to the project partners for reading, circulation to the advisory group and comment within four months of signature of the letter of agreement (precise date to be agreed). Subsequently they will deliver the revised text by the end of January 2013 (or by an alternative date to be mutually agreed), for a final set of review meetings.

Total researcher(s) fees are £10,000. One third of the fees will be payable on signature of the letter of agreement, the other two thirds on on completion and approval of the final paper. Any travel or communications costs would need to be agreed with the project coordinator in advance, and would be paid on production of agreed paperwork.

e. Qualifications/person specification

As the researcher (or researchers) tendering for this project you will have:

prior knowledge and experience of working on Indigenous Peoples’ rights and the extractive industries. experience of working with Indigenous Peoples communities/organisations demonstrated awareness of culturally appropriate research methodologies. an advanced degree or equivalent within a relevant field and/or a proven track record of research and publishing. fluency in Spanish, and other languages, in order to access original materials, would be an advantage.

Preference will be given to applications from, or including, Indigenous Peoples.

The project partners are willing to consider either one or several researcher(s) to undertake this research. Joint applications are therefore welcome, indicating how those involved propose to allocate the work between them.

f. How to apply

Any queries, or expressions of interest in the form of a brief covering letter and career résumé, with at least two references, are invited by 2 July 2012 to: Andy Whitmore at comms [at] piplinks [dot] org or via post to:- 225-229 Seven Sisters Road, London, N4 2DA.