Antecedentes

The United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) was established to accelerate progress on meeting the needs for women and girls worldwide. UN Women supports UN Member States as they set global standards for achieving gender equality, and work with governments and civil society to design laws, policies, programmes and services needed to implement these standards.

UN Women stands behind women’s equal participation in all aspects of life, focusing on five priority areas: increasing women’s leadership and participation; ending violence against women; engaging women in all aspects of peace and security processes; enhancing women’s economic empowerment; and making gender equality central to national development planning and budgeting. UN Women also coordinates and promotes the UN system’s work in advancing gender equality.

Gender perspective in humanitarian action is vital to understanding the different needs of women, girls, boys and men in order to generate positive and sustainable outcomes. In times of crisis gender roles and dynamics change, women often resort to negative coping mechanisms and GBV becomes more prevalent. It is essential to capture these issues in Uganda’s humanitarian response, both at the individual programming level in project design and in programme analysis and development.

 In recent months there has been a sudden increase in the humanitarian crisis in Uganda. Insecurity in neighbouring countries, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Sudan, has led to an increase of refugees to Uganda. In addition, food insecurity and malnutrition has risen. The aim of the project is to safeguard Gender Equality in all humanitarian action interventions and coordination mechanisms and ensure women's rights advocates are empowered to voice their needs in humanitarian crisis and beyond. 

Deberes y responsabilidades

Rationale of the Assignment:

UN Women Uganda, along with humanitarian partners, has identified the need for strengthening gender mainstreaming in the overall humanitarian response. The IASC Gender Marker is used as a tool in order to achieve this. Its main objective is not to simply add gender-sensitive words to a document, but to strengthen programming and analysis based on the different needs, concerns, capacities and contributions of the affected population. In 2014, through this project UN Women will increase efforts on engendering the overall response and the humanitarian coordination structure. UN Women will provide technical support to the UNCT in Uganda in implementing the Gender Marker tool and gender mainstreaming the humanitarian response in Uganda.

 Assignment objective:

The overall goal is to promote gender equality and non-discrimination throughout the humanitarian operation. The expected output is strengthened gender sensitive analysis, programming and implementation in all phases of emergency relief with particular emphasis on improved data and relief. The consultant will report to the UN Women Uganda Deputy Country Representative.

Specific objectives:
  • Participation in all relevant Government, Donor, UN Agency, NGO humanitarian meetings;
  • Conduct a gender analysis of the South Sudanese refugee crisis in Northern Uganda, with particular attention to the situation of women and girls;
  • Promote the inclusion of gender dimensions and multi sectoral GBV programme response into needs assessments tools, humanitarian programme documents and assists all implementing actors to incorporate gender equality into all funding appeal documents;
  • Facilitate 2 training workshops for humanitarian actors on implementing the Gender Marker, in partnership with UNHCR, UNFPA, WFP, FAO and UNRCO;
  • Review and analysis of humanitarian response documents, including providing technical inputs into UN/GoU resilience strategy (Refugee and Host Community Empowerment - ReHOPE), prepares a Gender Mainstreaming action plan and makes recommendations;
  • Identify UN Women’s interventions in UN/GoU Sustainable Livelihood Strategy and in ReHOPE;
  • Develop a fund raising proposal for UN Women interventions;
  • Develop a gender mainstreaming action plan for all sectors in cooperation with partners;
  • Establish a gender network of humanitarian and development partners at both national and local level;
  • Prepare monthly reports/updates to UN Women Country Office, RO, and HQ;
  • Identify strategic programme opportunities, approaches and modalities for strengthening gender and humanitarian action, in close collaboration with national development stakeholders and partners;
  • Liaise with relevant UN Women Thematic Section in the Regional Center in Nairobi and Headquarters, notably those in policy and program divisions for effectively technical support, project management and quality assurance, to ensure adequate provision of services, flow of information and the project’s compliance with its obligations;
  • Perform other tasks as required.
 Deliverables and reporting arrangements:
 
Deliverables:
  • A detailed mission report that provides a gender analysis of South Sudanese refugee issues;
  • A Gender Mainstreaming humanitarian action in Uganda Strategy and action plan developed;
  • 2 Gender Marker/ gender mainstreaming trainings conducted;
  • Gender specific technical inputs to the UN/GoU Sustainable Livelihood Strategy and in ReHOPE;
  • A gender and humanitarian partners network;
  • A mapping of agencies working on gender and humanitarian action, including donor mapping;
  • A funding raising proposal to support UN Women’s work on gender and humanitarian action;
  • Regular briefings to the Country Representative on the weekly interagency meetings, bringing to the attention key follow up issues;
  • Monthly update report prepared, and as appropriate regular reports on weekly interagency meetings of various stakeholder meetings.

Competencias

Corporate Competencies:
  • Integrity, professionalism and respect for diversity;
  • Demonstrated sensitivity, discretion, tact;
  • Commitment to advancement of gender equality and women’s rights;
  • Commitment to upholding the organizational values and principles of UN Women.
Functional Competencies:
  • Very strong communication and interpersonal skills, demonstrated ability to build trust;
  • Excellent organizational and planning skills;
  • Ability to apply judgment in the context of assignments given, plan own work and manage conflicting priorities;
  • Demonstrated ability to contribute to multi-disciplinary teams and to work with and influence people from diverse backgrounds;
  • Writing skills that include an attention to detail as well as a grasp of conceptual frameworks;
  • Excellent communication, reporting and capacity building skills;
  • Sharing knowledge across the organization and building a culture of knowledge sharing and learning;
  • Strong computer skills, including word processing, presentation packages (Power Point), Internet, etc;
  • Strong skills in the application of communication technologies;
  • Ability to travel and work in humanitarian settings and in a multicultural environment;
Technical Competencies:
  • Technical knowledge and expertise in gender and humanitarian issues;
  • Issues and risks affected program implementation are identified early and addressed effectively;
  • Good conceptual and analytical capacity is required;
  • Good presentation skills and good technical knowledge on gender and humanitarian issues, and gender marker in particular;
  • Ability to explain complex gender and humanitarian issues in a simple way, to raise awareness in a participatory approach and in a consensual manner with respect for various levels of understanding, professional abilities and cultural differences.

Habilidades y experiencia requeridas

Education:
  • Advanced University Master’s degree in Development Studies, Social Sciences, International Relations, and including course work relating to gender equality and women’s rights.
Experience:
  • At least 4 years of progressively responsible international experience in mainstreaming gender equality in humanitarian issues, preferably with UN and INGOs;
  • Experience implementing the IASC Gender Marker in humanitarian context, including facilitating trainings for clusters;
  • Experience in advocacy work around gender and humanitarian issues;
  • Strong technical competence in gender equality issues, Gender Based Violence (GBV) women's rights frameworks;
  • Familiarity of humanitarian coordination mechanisms, systems and structures within UN and INGOs;
  • Understanding of funding facilities for humanitarian responses and in drafting program proposals for resource mobilization;
  • Understanding of the work of UN Women and the broad range of issues and concepts around gender mainstreaming humanitarian responses;
  • Understanding of gender humanitarian issues in Africa;
  • Experience in the usage of computers and office software packages, experience in handling of web based management systems, preferably PeopleSoft.
Language Requirements:
  • Proficiency in written and spoken English;
  • Knowledge of another UN language an asset.