UN WOMEN Jobs - 49959- National Consultant - Assessment of UN Women-Suppo

National Consultant - Assessment of UN Women-Supported Projects on Gender-Sensitive Food Security and Sustainable Livelihoods

Advertised on behalf of

UN WOMEN

Location :

(Open to CARICOM Nationals Only) Home-based with some travel within the CARICOM Region

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

13-Oct-2014

Application Deadline :

03-Oct-14 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

National Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

35 Days

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

Many international commitments support women's economic empowerment, including the Beijing Platform for Action, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and a series of International Labour Organisation conventions on gender equality. UN Women supports women's economic empowerment in line with these, and with the growing body of evidence that shows gender equality significantly contributes to advancing overall economies and sustainable development in communities and countries.

UN Women’s global strategic work plan has established four key outcomes areas for women’s economic empowerment including: policies adopted and implemented to strengthen women’s economic empowerment; companies (private and public) promote women’s economic empowerment; gender-responsive services (transport, utilities, markets, water, energy, etc.) to enhance women’s livelihoods; and strengthened coordination of the UN system to adoption of a common strategy on women’s economic empowerment.

The portfolio of support on Economic Empowerment in the UN Women Multi-Country Office for the Caribbean comprises of, for the most part, a focus on child and gender-responsive social protection and advancing decent work for domestic workers. The office had also launched some very initial support towards gender-sensitive food security and sustainable development. In 2012, the UN Women Multi-Country Office, issued a regional Call for project proposals focusing on gender-sensitive food security and sustainable development initiatives in the Caribbean that:

Supported rural women, small farmers and women entrepreneurs, including agri-business actors, in the context of land rights, agricultural production, food security, livelihoods, natural resource conservation, and climate change;
Supported the integration of a gendered approach to food security policy and action plans;
Promoted access to green economy opportunities by women, particularly rural and agricultural women producers and women in fisheries;
Increased the capacity of women to establish or undertake economic enterprises, including green economy initiatives.

Four organisations in the CARICOM region were selected and entered into partnerships with UN Women in 2012 that will be expiring in 2014. All the projects targeted women farmers or rural women producers of arts and craft.

The UN Women Multi-Country Office is seeking to further strengthen its portfolio of work on gender and sustainable development. As the Caribbean countries are highly vulnerable to climate change and disasters, the emergent programme of support should focus on interventions that address the need to balance natural resource allocation and use with the needs of current and future populations, while ensuring gender equality and women's economic empowerment remains central to this process.

With the above in mind, UN Women is seeking to hire a consultant to undertake an assessment of four abovementioned projects on gender-sensitive food security and sustainable development, with a view to identifying opportunities for best practices; identify gaps and challenges and propose strategies to address these in the future; and effective approaches that could be scaled up. The results of this assessment will inform UN Women’s approach for strengthening its work and programme of technical support in the CARICOM region on gender and sustainable development.

Duties and Responsibilities

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.

Under the overall supervision of the UN Women Representative and the day-to-day supervision of the UN Women Programme Specialist – Economic and Political Leadership, the consultant will be contracted to assess three projects on gender-sensitive food security and sustainable development to determine the extent to which the projects fulfilled their respective objectives; identify effective approaches utilised during project implementation; identify gaps and challenges and propose strategies to address these in the future; and identify potential best practice models that could be scaled up.

Deliverables and Specific Activities:

The consultant is expected to undertake the following:

Review documentation on the respective projects such as project documents, quarterly reports and other relevant documentation to be provided by UN Women;
Review relevant UN Women corporate guidance on gender and sustainable development interventions, such as the agency’s Strategic Plan, Guidance Note on Economic Empowerment, Strategic Note for the UN Women Multi-Country Office for the Caribbean, Annual Work Plan, and Implementation Plan among others to be provided by UN Women;
Prepare tools to facilitate assessment of the four projects, for UN Women’s clearance;
Prepare an outline of the Assessment, which specifies page length per each section, for UN Women’s clearance;
Conduct interviews with respective implementing partners as well as focus group discussions with beneficiaries in two of the countries;
Conduct interviews with donors, as well as regional and international development partners (to be identified by UN Women) working on gender and sustainable development in the CARICOM Region.

Prepare an Assessment Report the components of which are to include the following:

An assessment on the extent to which the projects fulfilled their objectives;
Identification of effective approaches utilised by the projects and the gaps and challenges, as well as recommendations on how to address these gaps and challenges in the future;
Identification of potential best practice models that could be scaled up into a more comprehensive regional programme on Gender Responsive Sustainable Development.

Competencies

Core Values:

Demonstrates integrity and fairness;
Demonstrates professional competence and is conscientious and efficient in meeting commitments, observing deadlines and achieving results;
Displays cultural, gender, religious, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Functional Competencies:

Strong analytic and organisation skills;
Excellent command of written and spoken English including the ability to convey complex concepts and recommendations, in a clear and persuasive style tailored to match different audiences.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Post-graduate degree, at least a Master’s degree, in one of the following areas: Social Policy, Gender Studies, Development Studies, Project Management, Public Policy, and/or a related field of study.

Required Experience:

A minimum of 5 years of progressively responsible and relevant experience in the field of gender and development; public policy, programme and/or project management and specific work experience in the NGO sector;
Demonstrated experience in working on gender and sustainable development in the CARICOM region;
Demonstrated experience in creating Monitoring and Evaluation frameworks to support a project;
Ability to work independently and as part of a small team, manage competing priorities and perform well under pressure;
Proven expertise in the use of results-based methodologies;
Consultancy is open to all CARICOM nationals.

Language:

Excellent command of written and spoken English.

Location and Duration:

The contract will run for 35 working days within the period 13 October 2014 to 28 November 2014. The consultancy will be home-based with travel expected within the CARICOM region.

Administrative Information

Payment:

The fee will be negotiated before contracting. Each payment will be based on a predefined and formal agreement between UN Women and the consultant and will be disbursed based on satisfactory completion of agreed deliverables.

Hardware, software, and communication:

The consultant must be equipped with a portable computer (laptop). The consultant must be reasonably accessible by email and telephone (preferably mobile). The use of reliable, internet-based communication (Skype or equivalent) is required.

Application for Consultancy

Please submit your application by submitting the following:

A cover letter highlighting the specific post for which you are applying;
The completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment;
Detailed curriculum vitae including a description of main achievements;
A price proposal quoted in United States dollars (US$) indicating daily rates and preferred fee structure based on deliverables.

Applications should be submitted by email to the attention of Melissa Bohne, UN Women (melissa.bohne@unwomen.org) by 3rd October 2014.