Invitation for Tender for the development of an application for the Project Journeys
1. Awarding Authority
(i) Organization
The Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS) serves as an overall regional forum for intergovernmental cooperation and coordination among the 10 CBSS Member States – Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Sweden, as well as the European Union. The Permanent International Secretariat was established in Stockholm in October 1998. The budget of the Secretariat is financed by annual contributions from the CBSS Member States as well as through project funds. The Secretariat is organized in a core team and specialized units. The Secretariat’s premises are located at Wollmar Yxkullsgatan 23, Stockholm.
The CBSS hosts the Expert Group on Children at Risk, a platform for regional cooperation to promote children’s rights and child protection. The Expert Group consists of senior officials appointed by the CBSS Ministries responsible for children’s issues.
For more information about the Children at Risk Unit, please see the website https://childrenatrisk.cbss.org/organisation/about-us/secretariat/
CBSS Secretariat
P.O. Box 2010
S-103 11 Stockholm, Sweden
Phone: +46 8 440 1920
Website: www.cbss.org
(ii) Contact persons
Person authorized for contacts with tenderers:
Ms Gertrude Opira
+46 8 4401922
[email protected]
Children at Risk Unit
Ms Olivia Lind Haldorsson
+46 730 564592
[email protected]
2. Requested services
Background:
Children globally experience different forms of violence such as physical abuse, sexual abuse, hate-crime, trafficking and exploitation. In many European countries, children exposed to violence and abuse are referred to a ‘Barnahus’ (Children’s house), multidisciplinary and interagency service where different agencies (judicial, social, medical) respond to child victims of crimes in one child-friendly, non-residential premise and offers comprehensive services for the child under one roof.
As part of an EU co-funded project, ‘Safe and Informed Journeys through Barnahus’, CBSS seeks a supplier for the development of an application to be used in the context of the Barnahus.
Children who have been exposed to violence have a right to protection, recovery, and justice. To minimise stress and to avoid (re)traumatisation as a result of the many parallel interventions the child undergoes, it is crucial to ensure child friendly, professional and coordinated response, and that the child has access to information throughout the process When the child comes to Barnahus it is a stressful situation. The child has, suspectedly, been subject to crime, which puts a tremendous amount of stress upon the child. Furthermore, the investigative process is often stressful for the child involving strong feelings such as shame and guilt. A person who is under a lot of stress tends to perceive the surrounding events in a less coherent manner, even more so for a child.
The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child provides that children have the right to be heard and to receive information on all matters pertaining to them, in an age appropriate and developmentally sensitive manner. This is a key requirement for fulfilling their rights to participation. For more information about the specific requirements for Barnahus Services, see the PROMISE Barnahus Quality Standards.
In line with the main objective to promote and support the rights of all victims of crime, the JOURNEYS project focuses on the rights of child victims to access child-friendly information and participation at Barnahus, by proposing a safe and informed journey through Barnahus. The journey needs to be comprehensible, manageable and meaningful for the child, i.e. giving the child a sense of coherence. This requires that the child is informed concerning the matters, options, and possible decisions to be taken, as well as the consequences of the arrangements and decisions.
The objective is to develop practical and child-friendly support tools: a Barnahus-branded app, to inform child victims and their caregivers about their journey from referral to Barnahus.
The requested features to be included in the application are specified below:
- A Barnahus-branded application that includes information about all interventions offered and the process in Barnahus.
- Ability to add information about the different stages of the child’s journey at Barnahus, catered to different ages, abilities, as well as information for caregivers.
- Ability to tailor the application to different Barnahus premises, in a way that the child/user is able to visualize the specific Barnahus they’re going to visit.
- Ability to be localized in multiple languages, starting with English and Swedish.
- Ability to do a virtual tour of the different environments that the child will visit when at the Barnahus (see attached images in Annex 2).
- Additional child-friendly activities for distraction and relaxation.
Target group:
- Children (0-17 yrs inclusive), primarily those victims of crime
- Authorities/Practitioners involved at Barnahus
Budget range: 280,000 – 320,000 euros
The tenderer is requested to provide a detailed budget specifying costs for each item/service.
3. Requirements on the goods or services
In order to be eligible for the award of contract, the tenderer must fulfil the following requirements:
- Proven experience developing similar applications and tools.
- Previous experience working with international organizations and non-profits. Desirable experience working for children as a target group.
- Technical and professional capacity to carry out the assignment within the allocated time frame, and to accommodate to potential changes, scale up, as well as maintenance of the application, including after the contract end date. CBSS recommends that the budget includes a specific amount for future maintenance of the application.
- Supplier must comply with CBSS’ Child Safeguarding Policy (see Annex 3) and CBSS’ GDPR policy (see Annex 4).
4. Date of delivery
The project duration is 24 months from 1st of January 2023. The first version of the application is expected to be ready during the first 6-9 months of the project to allow time to use and adapt it according to needs.
5. Additional information
Other relevant information may be presented.
6. Subcontracting
Full or subcontracting will not be authorized.
A bid may be made by a consortium of legal and/or natural persons. In such a case the leading partner has to be designated, who will take full responsibility for successfully providing the contracted service.
7. Submission of Tenders
The offers must be submitted by email to Ms Laura Daoud, [email protected], and must arrive no later than 24 March 2023.
Tenders should be complete and elaborate, including detailed budgets and schedules, for the product and features indicated above, and following specific needs described in Terms of Reference.
8. Documents to be submitted by tenderers
The Tenderer must submit the documents/information listed in Annex 1.
All correspondence relating to this invitation for tender must be done in English. The Awarding Authority reserves the right to request further information from tenderers after receipt of their documents. Tenderers will be immediately notified of the receipt of their bids.
9. Duration of contract
The Awarding Authority intends to have the contract period begin Spring 2023. However, the Awarding Authority reserves the right to postpone this date without stating the reason.
The contract period will last up to two years. Earlier termination of the contract shall be allowed with a 3-month advance notice.