Website Consultant (Repository for TROSA)

TERMS OF REFERENCE

Oxfam is a global movement of people who are fighting inequality to end poverty and injustice. Across regions, from the local to the global, we work with people to bring change that lasts.

1.              PURPOSE OF THIS CONSULTANCY

The purpose of this assignment is to develop a website to:

1. Serve as a repository for one of Oxfam’s Flagship Water Governance Programmes – TROSA’s learnings, impacts, knowledge products, and stories for long-term public access.
2. Promote awareness and education on inclusive water governance among youth, women, community leaders, policymakers, civil society organisations, businesses, researchers, and academics.   
3. Promote regional cooperation and cross-border dialogue for inclusive and just water governance.
4. Showcase community voices, local innovations, and youth and women’s leadership in water governance.
5. Encourage and nurture partnerships for inclusive water governance.

2.              BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT

Transboundary Rivers of South Asia (TROSA), implemented since 2017, has catalysed important progress in inclusive water governance, climate resilience, and regional cooperation across the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna (GBM) basins. A key strength of TROSA lies in its extensive network of 18 regional and national partners, enabling deep engagement across diverse geographies and communities in South Asia. This wide geographic coverage, combined with strong partnerships and community-driven knowledge, has generated valuable insights, stories, and evidence for civil society, practitioners, researchers, policy actors, and future regional initiatives.

As the programme approaches the end of its second, and possibly final, phase, a dedicated website is being envisioned as a digital space to:

• Preserve TROSA’s learning and impact and leave a legacy for future use and reference
• Celebrate its multi-country, partnership-focused model and demonstrate TROSA’s regional programme
• Inspire continued collaboration and serve as a knowledge hub on water governance across South Asia.

3.              SCOPE OF WORK

The consultant is required to design and develop a website that includes the following: 

Website contents

• A visually appealing, user-friendly, and responsive design
• Multilingual support to cater to diverse South Asian audiences in languages including English, Nepali, Hindi, Dzongkha, Assamese and Bangla.
• The website should be designed with multiple interconnected pages with nested sections. These sections may feature partners, river basins, countries, photo galleries, maps, archives, videos, podcasts, e-books, news, articles, blogs, featured projects, thematic programmes of work etc.
• It should also provide the flexibility to easily add new partners and create or manage additional pages as needed.

Content Management and Integration

• The website should be built using a user-friendly Content Management System (CMS) that enables the editorial team to easily upload, edit, and manage content without requiring technical support.
• It should support a structured user system, with a small group of editors overseeing content contributed by approximately 20–30 contributors.
• The consultant should also define and recommend appropriate file size limits for photo and video uploads to ensure optimal website performance.

The CMS should enable:

• Uploading and updating text, images, and multimedia content across different sections of the website.
• Integration of TROSA and partner’s social media sites.
• Publishing and managing articles, blogs, success stories, news, photographs, press releases, podcasts event etc.
• Uploading and categorizing documents and publications (e.g., reports, research papers, policy briefs, toolkits, etc.) for public access and download.
• Creating and updating web pages or subpages as needed, with flexibility to add new sections or modify existing ones.
• Managing featured content on the homepage or other highlight sections.
• The consultant should ensure that the content management interface is intuitive, well-documented, and accompanied by a brief training session for TROSA team members on how to use it effectively.

Technical Requirements of the website

• Built on an open-source CMS to ensure flexibility, sustainability, and cost-effectiveness          
• Custom-designed UI/UX: The website design should be unique and tailor-made for TROSA
• Mobile-responsive and multilingual, supporting English, Bangla, Nepali, and Hindi interfaces
• Decentralised content management: National and Regional Partners should be able to upload and manage content relevant to their countries or regions, with content approval rights retained by an editorial board
• Lightweight and optimised for low-bandwidth environments, ensuring accessibility in remote areas
• Search Engine Optimisation (SEO): The website should be optimised for search engines to maximize reach and visibility
• The website should have a strong security system to protect against hacking, external attacks, viruses, and ensure proper data protection.
• The website must comply with copyright laws and should not host or use any content that infringes on intellectual property rights.
• Easily updatable structure: The editorial team should be able to add or modify content, documents, and media files independently without technical support.
• Performance optimisation: The site should have a fast loading speed and image compression.

Accessibility:

• The website should be designed and developed to be accessible to people with disabilities, following Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.1) or higher.
• This includes features such as alt text for images, readable contrast ratios, keyboard navigation, screen reader compatibility, and clear font choices.
• The consultant should also provide a short Accessibility Guideline document explaining how TROSA team members can maintain accessibility standards when uploading or editing content.

4.             DELIVERABLES

Specific outputs and deliverables

The consultant is expected to deliver the following outputs:

1. Inception Report: A detailed project plan outlining the implementation approach, work schedule, key milestones, and proposed mock-ups or wireframes for approval by the TROSA PMU. This will include securing domain name(s) for the website.
2. Content Gathering and Writing Support: The consultant will provide engaging and easy-to-understand content for the website. The consultant will liaise with project partners to gather content, compile, and organise content inputs necessary for website development.
3. Prototype: A draft version of the website with basic functionality and design for review and feedback by the TROSA PMU and partners. This will include navigation structure, sample pages, and initial content integration.
4. Final Website: Based on the criteria mentioned in this ToR, a fully functional, mobile-responsive, multilingual website deployed on the hosting server, tested for performance, security, and accessibility. The final version should incorporate feedback received during the prototype review. With durable hosting support secured.
5. All original content developed for the website, including text, graphics, photographs, videos, audio, datasets, and other knowledge products (unless otherwise credited), shall be licensed under a Creative Commons license.
6. User Guide and Training: Comprehensive documentation and a step-by-step user guide (digital and printable) explaining how to upload, edit, and manage content. The consultant will also conduct a short virtual or in-person training session for Oxfam and partner focal points. If in person, the workshop will be organised by Oxfam, including travel and logistics.
7. Handover Package:
   Upon completion, the consultant will provide:
   1. Admin credentials and access to hosting and CMS backend
   1. Backup of all website files and databases
   1. A summary of technical specifications and configurations used.
   1. Post-Launch Support Guidance/Commitments: The consultant will provide technical support for a reasonable period after the website launch. This could include fixing bugs, updating changes, extended hosting, website domain retention, etc.

5.              PAYMENT SCHEDULE

Remuneration is based on the submission of final deliverables according to the schedule. No payment will be made in advance.

6.              METHODOLOGY

• The detailed modality of the assignment and work plan will be agreed upon during the consultation based on the narrative proposal and the methodology proposed by the consultant and agreed upon by Oxfam.
• The consultant/agency will report to the project’s core team with TROSA Communications Coordinator as the main point of contact. 
• Regular updates will be delivered through scheduled virtual meetings.
• Estimated timeline:

7.              PROFILE REQUIREMENTS

The company/ individual(s) should have the following competencies:

Essential criteria

• Demonstrated experience in developing organisational/ knowledge/advocacy/influencing-focused websites.
• Sufficient and qualified team members and expertise to deliver the assignment
• Deep understanding of the geopolitical context of South Asia and awareness of the status of civic space.

Desired criteria

• Proven experience in developing websites for NGOs, CSOs, or similar initiatives focused on human rights or environmental rights defence and with strong security measures against external attacks to the website.
• Experience of and expertise in participatory or user-centric designing
• Strong understanding and experience in content development and presentation for community engagement and advocacy
• Experience in training non-technical people in content management systems and good practices to manage a website in a safe and secure way.

8.              APPLICATION PROCESS

Submission deadline

Quotations and applications must reach Oxfam no later than 13 April 2026, 23:59 hours (GMT+7:00).

Submission instructions

Responses must be submitted electronically to: info.trosa@oxfam.org

The subject of the mail should be : [ToR Reference – Proposal Submission + [Name of bidder]]

Clarifications

Any questions, remarks or requests for clarification can be sent up to 7 days before the submission deadline in writing. We will not be able to entertain any requests for extension of deadline unfortunately.

Administrative compliance (list of documents to be submitted)

Responses must be submitted and prepared in English and received by the deadline.

To be shortlisted for evaluation against award criteria, the following documents must be included in the application:

Evaluation and award criteria

Incomplete applications will not be assessed; only quotations that meet the administrative criteria will be assessed.

Award decisions will be based on best value for money criteria covering both technical quality and price.

The award criteria are assessed according to the following distribution of points:

Oxfam  withholds the right to conduct interviews with one or more potential suppliers before an award decision is made. Purpose of the interview is to seek further clarification on the submitted quotations and learn more about the background and previous experiences of the potential suppliers and their teams.

9.              OTHER CONDITIONS

Issuance of this Terms of Reference does not constitute an award commitment on the part of Oxfam, nor does it commit Oxfam to pay for costs incurred in the preparation and submission of a bid.

The attached Annexes are an integral part of this Request for Proposals.

Oxfam may contact bidders to confirm contacts, addresses, bid amount and to confirm that the bid was submitted for this solicitation.

Quotation validity

• The quotation shall be valid for 90 days from the date of submission. If this is not possible, the bidder may propose a different timeframe.
• If the bidder is awarded the contract, all information provided in the quotation and negotiation process is contractually binding.

False statements

Bidders must provide full, accurate and complete information as required by this solicitation and Annexes. False statements in bids constitutes grounds for immediate termination of any agreement with the supplier. OXFAM takes fraud, misstatements, falsification, manipulation, alteration of facts and/or documents very seriously, has a zero tolerance policy to such behaviours, and may choose to take legal action in a case of misrepresented disclosures by Contractors.

Conflict of interest

Bidders must provide disclosure of any past, present or future relationships with any parties associated with the issuance, review or management of this solicitation and anticipated award.  Failure to provide full and open disclosure may result in Oxfam having to re-evaluate the selection of a potential bidder.

Right to Select/ Reject

Oxfam reserves the right to select and negotiate with those firms it determines, in its sole discretion, to be qualified for competitive proposals and to terminate negotiations without incurring any liability.  Oxfam also reserves the right to reject any or all proposals received without explanation.

Reserved rights

All applications and quotes become the property of Oxfam, and Oxfam reserves the right in its sole discretion to:

• To disqualify any offer based on applicant’s failure to follow solicitation instructions
• To waive any deviations by the applicant from the requirements of this terms of reference that, in Oxfam’s opinion, are considered immaterial defects requiring rejection or disqualification; or where such a waiver will promote increased competition
• Extend the time for submission of responses after notification to all applicants
• Terminate or modify the process at any time and re-issue the request for quotation to whomever Oxfam deems appropriate
• Issue an award based on the initial evaluation of offers without discussion
• Award only part of the activities in the solicitation or issue multiple awards based on solicitation activities

10.           CODE OF CONDUCT

Oxfam is committed to integrity in its operations and supply chains and ensuring high ethical standards. Complying with all laws and regulations and ensuring fair competition are fundamental to this commitment. We actively promote these principles and standards, and expect all Oxfam suppliers to demonstrate commitment towards them.

All consultants/applicant are required to agree and adhere to the Oxfam Supplier Code of Conduct, whereas individuals (including consultants) must sign the Oxfam Non Staff Code of Conduct[2]. These Codes of Conduct set out the specific standards and principles in the areas of human and labour rights, environmental impact and anti-corruption that suppliers must follow.

11.           REPORTING OF FRAUD & UNETHICAL BEHAVIOUR

Oxfam’s  reporting and whistleblowing mechanisms are available for Suppliers as well Oxfam employees, to ensure that Oxfam continues to operate under the highest ethical standards and principles.

You can use these reporting channels confidentially, anonymously, and in your own language to report any concerns involving fraud, corruption, waste, abuse or safeguarding concerns.

[2] Non-Staff Code of Conduct applies for any self-employed individuals or contracted employees of suppliers who are working on Oxfam sites, or who have access to Oxfam materials, or who may represent Oxfam in any manner but are not part of Oxfam’s legal entity)