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Consultancy to Develop a National Ranger Safeguarding Guideline

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Consultancy to Develop a National Ranger Safeguarding Guideline

1. Background

Community rangers and scouts in Kenya play a vital role in biodiversity conservation, human-wildlife conflict mitigation, and community engagement. However, recent assessments including a 2024 ranger perception survey by the Kenya Wildlife Conservancies Association (KWCA) and WWF highlight critical gaps in ranger welfare, professionalism, safeguarding awareness, gender inclusion, and human rights compliance.

KWCA, as the national umbrella body for wildlife conservancies, is committed to strengthening safeguarding and professional standards across its membership. In alignment with the Universal Rangers Support Alliance (URSA) standards and Kenya’s legal and policy framework, KWCA seeks to develop a National Ranger Safeguarding Guideline. This guideline will provide a harmonized framework to promote ethical conduct, accountability, gender equality, and protection from harm across all conservancies.

2. Purpose of the Assignment

The purpose of this consultancy is to develop a comprehensive National Conservancy Rangers Safeguarding Guideline that will provide a standardized framework to guide conservancies rangers’ employers and conservancy rangers in upholding the highest standards of safeguarding, human rights, professionalism, and ethical conduct within conservancies in Kenya.

The guideline will establish/propose clear principles, policy provisions and operational procedures that ensure the protection of community members including other conservancy stakeholders, conservancy staff from harm, abuse, exploitation, harassment, and misconduct in the course of their duty. It will particularly address risks related to sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment (PSEAH), gender-based violence, and abuse of authority, which may arise in conservancies where conservancy rangers interact with communities.

The consultancy will ensure that the safeguarding framework:

  • Aligns with international ranger welfare and safeguarding standards, particularly those set by the Universal Rangers Support Alliance (URSA) standards and other relevant global ranger initiatives
  • Integrates human rights-based approaches (HRBA) to conservation, ensuring that rangers’ operations respect, protect, and promote rights and dignity of local communities and conservancy members.
  • Promotes gender equality and social inclusion by recognizing and addressing the different risks, vulnerabilities, and barriers faced by women, youth and marginalized groups within both the ranger teams and the communities they serve.
  • Establishes zero tolerance to Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment (PSEAH) and Gender-Based Violence (GBV), including clear reporting mechanisms and survivor-centered responses procedures.
  • Strengthens accountability, professionalism, and ethical conduct of conservancy rangers
  • Provides practical institutional guidance to conservancies and institutions employing conservancy rangers, including conservancy boards and management, on safeguarding compliance, risk management and integration of safeguarding measures within conservancy governance structures.
  • Defines minimum safeguarding standards that can be adopted across conservancies while allowing flexibility for contextual adaptation at conservancy level.

Upon completion, the guideline will be reviewed and endorsed by KWCA and adopted by member conservancies as a national reference framework for safeguarding and ethical ranger conduct

3. Scope of Work

The Consultant will undertake the following tasks to develop the National Conservancy Rangers Safeguarding Guideline:

  • Inception
  • Hold an inception meeting with KWCA to clarify expectations, methodology and timelines for the assignment
  • Prepare and submit a brief inception report outlining the methodology, stakeholder engagement approach, workplan, and deliverable schedule.
  • Desk Review

Conduct a comprehensive review of relevant policies, standards, and frameworks to inform the development of the guideline. This will include, but not limited to:

  • Review relevant project documents, including project provisions
  • Review URSA standards and global best practices on ranger safeguarding
  • Review Kenya’s Wildlife Conservation and Management Act (2013), labor laws, human rights legislation, gender and Human resource policies, and relevant constitutional provisions
  • Review existing KWCA Conservancy Scout SoPs, Code of Conduct, and conservancy governance guidelines
  • Stakeholder Consultations

Conduct inclusive and participatory consultations with key stakeholders to gather perspectives, identify safeguarding risks, and ensure the guideline reflects practical realities within conservancies

Consultations will include, but not be limited to:

    • KWCA secretariate and relevant programs and policy staff
    • Landscape level conservancy associations
    • Conservancy rangers’ representatives, including women rangers and ranger leadership
    • Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) and other relevant government institutions
    • Human rights, safeguarding and gender experts
    • Community representatives, including women, youth and marginalized groups
  • Development of the National Ranger Safeguarding Guideline including safeguarding reporting and response protocol

Based on the desk review and stakeholder consultations, the consultant will develop a comprehensive National Conservancy Rangers Safeguarding Guideline. The guideline should provide practical, adaptable across conservancies and aligned with national legal frameworks and international safeguarding standards.

  • Validation and Finalization
  • Facilitate at least one national validation workshop with key stakeholders to review and validate the draft safeguarding guideline
  • Incorporate stakeholder feedback from the validation process and submit a revised final guideline

4. Specific Deliverables

The Consultant will be expected to produce the following deliverables during the assignment:

  1. A detailed inception report outlining the proposed methodology and approach, detailed workplan, stakeholder consultation plan and key reference materials and frameworks.
  2. Draft National Ranger Safeguarding Guideline
  3. Final National Ranger Safeguarding Guideline in editable formats

5. Duration and Level of Effort

  • Duration: Expected to take 25 consultancy days

6. Required Qualifications

  • Master’s degree in law, Human Rights, Governance, Gender Studies, Environmental Policy, Wildlife Management, or related field.
  • At least 8–10 years of experience in Human rights policy development, safeguarding frameworks, gender and social inclusion programming, conservation governance or ranger-related policy
  • Demonstrated experience developing national-level guidelines or policy frameworks
  • Familiarity with URSA standards and ranger welfare frameworks (preferred)
  • Experience integrating HRBA and gender-responsive approaches

7. Application Process

Interested consultants (individuals or firms) should submit:

  1. Technical Proposal including:
    • Understanding of the assignment
    • Proposed methodology
    • Work plan and timeline
  2. Financial Proposal
  3. CV(s) of lead consultant and team members
  4. At least two samples of similar work (policy/guideline development)
  5. References (minimum three)

 

Applications should be submitted electronically to KWCA vie email to [email protected] by Thursday 30th April 2026, indicating clearly on the email header the title of the consultancy.

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