Background

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. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women leads and coordinates United Nations system efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. UN Women provides strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors. 

UN Women in Bangladesh supports the government to implement commitments to international normative standards on gender equality and women’s human rights. The new UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF) for 2022-2026 was launched in 2021 and the corresponding UN Women Bangladesh Strategic Note (2022-2026), defining UN Women’s strategic engagement in Bangladesh, has also been finalized. The country strategy focuses on strengthening the national structures and mechanisms for gender mainstreaming in policies, plans, and budgets; supporting efforts to prevent and eliminate violence against women; promoting women’s access to decent and safe work; promoting policies and government investment in women’s empowerment and resilience building in the context of climate change, humanitarian crisis as well as other threats to peace and security. UN Women works with a range of stakeholders in Bangladesh including the government, civil society, and women’s organizations, youth, UN agencies, and donors, to promote gender equality and women’s empowerment.

Gender-responsive budgeting (GRB) is a strategic policy approach to strengthen planning and budgeting for the implementation of gender-related legislative and policy commitments. It seeks to incorporate a gender equality perspective into the budgetary process to ensure an efficient allocation of resources based on identified needs and to restructure revenues and expenditures to strengthen gender equality and empowerment of women (GEWE).  Global evidence shows that the use of GRB strengthens linkages between economic and social policy outcomes, enables tracking of public expenditure on GEWE, enhances participation and opportunities for civil society in economic policymaking, and contributes to effective and transparent planning and budgeting for enhancing government accountability. 

The idea of GRB developed out of a growing recognition that government budgets which command substantial resources are not gender neutral. Given the socially constructed roles ascribed to them, women and men occupy different social and economic positions within the household, workforce, and community. Women enter the public sphere while shouldering most of the unpaid care and domestic work which constrains their equal access to education, the economy, and the overall human development process. Proper gender-responsive planning and budgeting can bring positive impacts on the lives of men and women.

In Bangladesh, the Ministry of Finance (MoF) in 2005 affirmed its interest in incorporating poverty and gender concerns into the national Budget. Notwithstanding the efforts made by the government in mainstreaming gender in plans and budgets since the late 1990s, it was the implementation of public finance management reforms that provided the much-needed impetus to the process. These reforms allow for needs-based, transparent, accountable, and participatory processes. Over the last ten years, the percentage of direct gender responsive budget allocation has increased from 24.65 per cent (2009-2010 FY) to 38.6% per cent (2023-2024 FY) in Bangladesh[1]. To ensure the effective use of GRB allocation, the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs jointly with UN Women undertook an initiative to strengthen the capacity of line ministries to use GRB as a tool to mainstream gender equality across sectors.

JUSTIFICATION

While the Government of Bangladesh has taken several noteworthy steps to strengthen GRB. A rapid assessment of the GRB system in Bangladesh was commissioned by UN Women in 2014 (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bL4dE4r-GSaLDvpaT0TQrF22IbiLBEdH/view?usp=sharing), the assessment pointed to several gaps in the existing approach.  The assessment noted that there was no evidence of corrective actions taken by ministries/sectors to modify programmes/actions/strategies categorized as neutral or indirect gender-responsive projects to more gender-responsive. Moreover, it pointed to lack of conceptual clarity amongst government officials, wherein GRB was often misinterpreted as specific budgets for women. After the assessment in 2014, UN Women initiated a joint project with the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs to strengthen the capacity of government officials to better understand the implication of GRB in the sectoral ministries. 

However, according to the 2014 study, the overall institutional setup for GRB requires more specific reforms such as the introduction of separate codes for GRB in IBASS++, a budget classification system, and linking GRB with the Public Finance Management (PFM) with a mechanism to measure the impact of GRB interventions of line ministries through monitoring and evaluation system.   

The forward-looking assessment will provide a clear definition of GRB and its institutional framework, the assessment will also come up with recommendations to strengthen institutional arrangement for GRB and the application of GRB in sectoral ministries and divisions. In addition, the assessment will support the Government of Bangladesh to report for the 3rd round of monitoring of SDGs Indicator 5.c.1 (2023/2024). Alignment with SDGs indicator 5.c.1 will be an opportunity to refine the GRB approach with strong methodology and would help to take reforms initiatives by the Finance Division and Ministry of Women and Children Affairs. 

UN Women Bangladesh Country Office (BCO) is seeking to hire an international consultant to develop a detailed forward-looking assessment of Gender Responsive Budgeting to support financing for gender equality in the current socio-economic context. The assignment builds on the existing partnership between the UN Women Bangladesh Country Office and the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs. 

Duties and Responsibilities

scope of work

The primary objective of the assignment is to assess the effectiveness of GRB in Bangladesh and to provide recommendations and a forward-looking approach to use GRB more effectively to advance Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment. Specifically, the consultant will review relevant policies, key instruments, and mechanisms for GRB, and assess progress, achievements, and gaps in GRB’s approach and practices in Bangladesh.

Activities:

Activity: 1.1: Analyze progress, achievements, and gaps in the GRB approach used in Bangladesh

• Analyze the current macroeconomic situation associated with PFM reform, its action plan, and performance-based budgeting. How GRB can be positioned to support adequate financing for gender equality in the current geopolitical situation and LDC graduation context in Bangladesh.
• Analyze the inclusion of GRB in the budget cycle process, and highlight key achievements, challenges, and opportunities of GRB intervention in the last 10 years.   
• Develop a methodological note for Finance Division for GRB to be included in IBAS++, budget coding, budget classification, and overall budget-making process in Bangladesh.
• Review capacity development efforts on GRB by the Finance Division and Ministry of Women and Children Affairs and their effectiveness.  
• Document case studies on two sectors to capture past and current experiences and efforts to strengthen GRB.

Methodology: Desk Review, Document Analysis, Key Informant Interviews

Activity 1.2: Map the emerging context for gender-responsive planning and budgeting in Bangladesh

• Draw analysis from the updated Development Finance Assessment (DFA) and Financing Strategy (FS) for SDGs, highlighting and recommending new and existing forms of aid architecture and financing mechanisms to ensure continued financing for gender-related priorities.
• Map and review national and local level policies and guidelines for planning and budgeting and assess its implications for integrating gender into plans and budgets.

Methodology: Desk Review, Document Analysis, and Key Informant Interviews

Activity 1.3: GRB Strategy for the local government institutions

• Review laws and policies of local government and assess the perception of different stakeholders, including elected representatives, government officials, functionaries, and individual experts (CSOs, researchers, women’s organizations) to apply GRB at local government institutions.
• Identify entry points for GRB in local government institutions, and highlight opportunities and challenges to use GRB to advance gender equality at the local level.

Methodology: Key Informant Interviews, Survey, Document Analysis, and Stakeholder Consultations

4. duities and responsibilities

• Inception report with a methodology for GRB forward-looking assessment.  
• Secondary desk review, particularly review of national laws, policies, and existing institutional mechanisms related to GRB.
• Prepare tools for quantitative and qualitative data collection.
• Organize Key Informant Interviews with government officials, policymakers, academia, and civil society organizations.
• Develop a detailed analysis of the implication of GRB of two sectoral ministries.   
• Develop an assessment report covering the progress, achievements, and gaps of GRB in Bangladesh.
• Organize a validation workshop with relevant stakeholders on the assessment report.

Deliverables

LOCATIONS

In addition to the national level, the consultant will assess the situation of the sub-national level (2 districts), in line with previous programming efforts in the country, as well as geographic priority areas identified in the UNSDCF. 

The consultant will travel to Bangladesh once in early September for KII and FGD with relevant stakeholders. UN Women Bangladesh country office will arrange the travel as per UN Women policy. 

TECHNICAL ADVISORY GROUP

A Technical Advisory Group (TAG) with representation from the Finance Division, Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, Local Government Division, and GRB experts (5-7 members) will be formed to provide strategic and technical inputs to the consultant. 

The consultant will manage and ensure relevant translation, administrative and logistics support as required. Budget for this should be part of the professional fee detailing. UN Women Bangladesh country office will extend to enable this. 

TIME FRAME

40 working days between August to Novmeber 2023, subject to satisfactory performance and availability of funds.

PAYMENT MILESOTNES

Respective deliverables and documents will be reviewed by UN Women before processing any payment. 
The payment schedule is as follows:

SOME GUIDING QUESTIONS 

• How financing for gender equality is positioned in the macro-economic architecture, what are the existing policy provisions for financing gender equality in Bangladesh, and what are the gaps and opportunities in the context of LDC graduation?  

• How the overall GRB system is functioning in Bangladesh, how GRB activities are coded and clustered?

• How has GRB mainstreamed across sectoral ministries? What are the key learnings, challenges, and opportunities?   

• Do public sector allocations of expenditure planning effectively follow the GRB procedure? 

• How are the GRB results associated with allocation measured in the last 10 years? Specifically what measures are taken to ensure that the gender impact is assessed in public sector revenue and expenditure planning?

• Do the instruments of the government (circulars, directives, formats and guidance notes, and institutional processes) include gender considerations/parameters for GRB, whether these are effective? How to make the GRB system stronger as per the internally recognized/defined framework for GRB?

• What design features (beneficiary identification, targeting, and gender budgets) were adopted in sectoral programming and budgeting? Who are the key officials and how do they conduct pre-budget analysis for GRB to identify ministries’ priorities/activities for allocation? Do they have adequate capacity to do gender analysis of the sectoral ministry?   

• Do project appraisal processes integrate a gender perspective and include beneficiary targets and gender budgets?

• How local government’s budgets are drafted and approved, and whether there is a mechanism to address gender concerns in the local level planning and budgeting process. What would be possible recommendations to use GRB for the local government institutions, what are the opportunities and challenges in terms of applying GRB for local government institutions? 

• Is sex-disaggregated indicators and measures taken into consideration to assess gender impacts on the national budget? What is the status of GRB implementation in terms of results (allocation, participation, budgetary process/ expenditure tracking /impact on the lives of women and girls)?

GUIDING PRINCIPLES

• Human rights-based approach

• Cultural diversity, social inclusion, and gender sensitivity

• Needs-based approach

• Results-based programming and management

• Confidentiality

• Do no harm

•     Impartiality

SUPERVISION AND PERFORMANCE EVALUATION 

The consultant will work under the direct supervision of the UN Women Programme Analyst, Gender Responsive Governance. The consultant will also be collaborating with TAC (point 7) for advisory support. 

DUTY STATION, DSA, AND TRAVEL

• Home-based and travel to Bangladesh

• DSA and Travel: Travel is required; hence Air ticket and DSA is applicable as per UN Women policy. 

Competencies

Functional Competencies: 

? Proven experience in conducting research, high-quality policy analysis, and advice to the government in the field of macroeconomics and gender Proven work experience with the government and UN agencies in the similar field  

? Demonstrated ability to produce high-quality report in English

CORE COMPETENCIES 

? Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards

? Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UN Women

? Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality, and age sensitivity and adaptability

? Treats all people fairly without favoritism

? Fulfills all obligations to gender sensitivity and zero tolerance for sexual harassment

Required Skills and Experience