Scoping Mission to Identify Requirements for the Establishment of an Inviolable
Archive at the Iwokrama International Centre (IIC)
The following opportunity has arisen with the Commonwealth Secretariat. It
will probably require about a week in Guyana, sometime in April
Expressions of interest and requests for further information should be directed
to
Tim Newman
[log in to unmask]
+44 (0) 20 7747 6482
 

Terms of Reference
Background
The Iwokrama International Rainforest Programme was an outcome of the
Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Malaysia in 1989. At that
meeting, Heads of Government noted the generous offer of the then President
of Guyana, Desmond Hoyte, to set aside part of Guyana’s Amazonian tropical
forest (371,000 hectares or around 1 million acres– about 1 percent of
Guyana’s forest cover) for a pilot project under Commonwealth auspices to
study utilisation of the forest on a sustainable basis and the conservation of
species. Since that time, Iwokrama has been dedicated to demonstrating how
tropical rainforests can be managed in a manner that will lead to lasting
ecological, economic and social benefits to the people of Guyana and the
wider world.
The Iwokrama forest is part of the Guiana Shield forest at the edge of the
Amazonian rainforest and supports an extremely high level of biological
diversity. Surveys have so far identified 1,125 species of higher plant, 450
species of birds, 127 species of mammals, 114 species of amphibians and
reptiles and 420 species of fish. The Iwokrama forest is also home to healthy
populations of a number of globally endangered species including jaguars, giant
otters, black caimans, harpy eagles, scarlet macaws and arapaima. The forest
also has valuable timber resources as identified by its timber inventory surveys.
A Parliamentary Act of 1996 created both the Iwokrama site and the Iwokrama
International Centre (IIC), the organisation mandated to manage the forest
and develop, demonstrate and make available lessons learned in sustainable
management and utilisation of the forest’s many resources. The IIC is
governed by an international Board of Trustees whose members are jointly
selected by the Government of Guyana and the Commonwealth Secretariat.
The Commonwealth Secretariat has provided support to the Iwokrama
Programme for over 18 year and has recently completed a review of this
assistance in order to provide a solid foundation for the Secretariat to
determine the nature and extent of its future involvement with the programme.
One of the recommendations to come out of this review was to assist in the
establishment of an inviolable archive for the IIC. We have since received a
request from the IIC to provide an ecosystem/biodiversity archivist to
establish an appropriate archiving system, log lessons learned, identify notable
research findings for publication and identify gaps in research. This request is
attached.
Requirement
The Commonwealth Secretariat is keen to move ahead as quickly as possible in
implementation the IIC’s request for an ecosystem/biodiversity archivist, but is
also concerned to set this assignment within the broader context of archiving
and records management policies and practices within the Centre.
An Information Specialist is therefore required to undertake a scoping mission
to the Iwokrama International Centre in order to define the policy context
within which the ecosystem/biodiversity archivist will be working and
establishing the archiving system, and to explore whether further assistance
may also be needed to strengthen this aspect of the IIC in fulfilment of the
Iwokrama Act’s requirement for an inviolable archive.
The consultant will work closely with the IIC’s Director for Resource
Management and Training .
Expected Activities
The Consultant will undertake the following activities, inter alia:
• Assess the requirements of the Iwokrama Act with regard to the
Inviolable archive and what this means in practical terms for the IIC.
• Asses the current archive and archiving policies and practices
arrangements at the IIC for both physical and electronic resources
• Consider the Terms of Reference for an ecosystem/biodiversity
archivist in the context of the analysis that has been undertaken; and
• Assess whether further steps need to be taken to further support
archiving activities at the IIC in fulfilment of the Iwokrama Act.
Expected Outputs
The consultant will produce a full report of the scoping mission within one
week of return from Guyana. This report will include:
• A discussion on the requirements of the Iwokrama Act with regard to
the establishment of an inviolable archive and its practical implications for the
IIC.
• Details of the current archive system and resources
• Refined terms of reference for an ecosystem/biodiversity consultant
archivist
• Detailed personal profile for an ecosystem/biodiversity consultant
archivist
• Details of resource gaps (human and infrastructure)
Implementation Arrangements
It is expected that the scoping mission will require a maximum of five days in-
country, working at the IIC in Georgetown and visiting the Field Centre within
the Iwokrama Forest. The Consultant will be accompanied on the mission by
the Commonwealth Secretariat Governance and Institutional Development
Division Adviser for Technical Cooperation. The role of the adviser will be to
represent ComSec and work with the consultant to design an appropriate and
effective project.