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 and the third gender as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.

All human development and human rights issues involve gender dimensions. UN Women globally focuses on key priority areas that are fundamental to women’s equality, and that can unlock progress across the board. UN Women’s priority areas include increasing women’s leadership and participation in political spaces, ending violence against women, enhancing women’s economic empowerment, engaging in all aspects of women peace and security processes, making gender equality central to national planning and budgeting through Gender Responsive Budgeting (GRB) and advancing gender in intergovernmental processes.

UN Women’s work on GRB involves ensuring that national planning, budgeting, monitoring and evaluation processes incorporate a gender perspective. UN Women’s GRB programmes at the regional and country level have made significant contribution towards this by building political support, developing technical resources and capacities, generating good practices for improving women's access to services and increasing accountability for Gender Equality and Women’s empowerment (GEWE).  At the forefront of global, regional and local advocacy for application of GRB, UN Women has built partnerships with diverse government, inter-governmental and non-governmental partners to further efforts and demonstrate GRB’s relevance to sustainable development, aid effectiveness, public sector reform and financing for development.

In 2004-05, the report of the expert group of classification of government expenditure became instrumental in laying out the road map for GRB in India. This was followed by the adoption of “Budgeting for Gender Equity” as mission statement by the Ministry of Women and Child Development (MWCD), Government of India (GoI). In 2005-06, the Ministry of Finance, GoI introduced Gender Budget Statement (GBS) which aimed to reflect the quantum of budgetary allocations for programmes/schemes that substantially benefit women. Another important mechanism institutionalised by the Ministry of Finance was setting up of Gender Budget Cells (GBCs) which serve as focal points for mainstreaming gender through GRB. The rigour has been replicated in at least 19 states, some of which have produced GBS and set up GBCs.

UN Women’s Multi Country Office (MCO), based in New Delhi, India, is currently implementing a project with the objective of identifying strategies and operational approaches to strengthen on-going efforts in the area of GRB. Insights generated from this project will enable key stakeholders at the national and regional level to accelerate their efforts to ensure that women’s priorities are adequately reflected in national budgeting processes, and to make concrete changes for adequate resource allocation towards women’s priorities.

Taking this forward proposes to provide the requisite technical assistance and operational support on GRB at the National level and to the four state governments of Andhra Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Manipur. The technical assistance will be for strengthening GRB initiatives over the next two years through establishing relevant gender responsive policy tools for the larger impact of having inclusive and gender sensitive programmes and schemes of the government at the national and State level. Leveraging on the institutional capacity, past work and established networks and partnerships, UN Women through this programme will create an enabling environment by building capacities of key stakeholders to address gender issues and be instrumental in making the planning and budgeting process in the Government gender responsive.

This project focuses on the following dimensions:

• Create and strengthen institutional structures for GRB and institute methodological changes in Planning-Budgeting and Auditing (PBA) systems for enabling gender responsive actions
  • GRB mechanisms are refined and embedded within the government in the four states
• Enhance capacities of government officials and other stakeholders to implement the gender responsive PBA measures
  • Knowledge products on GRB are developed, including evidence based sectoral studies and customized training modules
  • Gender budgeting capacities of government stakeholders are strengthened and training capacities institutionalized in the four states
  • E-governance tool developed and piloted

Within this context, UN Women seeks the services of a State Technical Coordinator-Gender Responsive Budgeting (GRB) to be placed in each of the project states.

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the guidance and direct supervision of Project Coordinator and Team Lead, the State Technical Coordinator (GRB) will provide technical support in strengthening the efforts of the State Governments on Gender Responsive Budgeting.

The State Technical Coordinator (GRB) will work with the Project team to ensure that the project produces the results in the State to the required standards of quality and within the given time and cost specifications. 

The State Technical Assistance Coordinator (GRB) will have the following duties and responsibilities:

Strengthening Coordination and GRB Efforts at the State Level:

• Establish/ strengthen effective coordination mechanisms within and among Women and Child Development, Planning, Finance and other line departments to institutionalize and promote GRB in the state;
• Provide technical expertise and support to nodal department to set up/review and monitor institutional mechanisms and processes to adopt/advance GRB in the state including Gender Budget Statement, Gender Budget Cells, GBI;
• Assist the nodal department in undertaking actions to advance GRB in the state as per the mandate and priorities of the department;
• Coordinate with relevant actors including state legislators, CSOs and women’s networks on GRB and women’s budgets.

Research and Documentation:

• Undertake mapping and documentation of the planning, budgeting and auditing processes at the state level;
• Provide support in undertaking state specific scoping study and developing state action plan on GRB;
• Provide support in undertaking sectoral analysis and research studies for select sectors on GRB and developing state specific sectoral policy briefs;
• Document and disseminate resources and knowledge products on GRB, such as case studies and good practices at the state level;
• Undertake state level budgetary and policy analysis from a gender perspective, and prepare briefing reports to inform policy formulation.

Facilitating Training and Capacity Development of relevant constituents on GRB:

• Compile/ Develop Training tools, manual, and other resource material on GRB;
• Coordinate with the state nodal department and training institutions to conduct state specific training needs assessment, develop capacity building strategy and training calendar for GRB;
• Organize state level gender budgeting capacity development training programmes for state level officials, relevant stakeholders and create a pool of local GRB experts;
• Monitor the outcomes of the trainings by providing support in development of tools and training reports.

Implementation of project at state level:

• Coordinate with project team for timely completion of project deliverables including periodic reporting;
• Preparation of monthly progress reports;

Any other duties as assigned by the supervisor.

Deliverables:

• Input and technical expertise provided to state nodal and line departments on GRB;
• Evidence based state action plan developed with the state nodal department for advancing GRB and gender mainstreaming in the state;
• Institutional mechanisms and processes to strengthen GRB developed and instituted;
• Training and capacity development of state officials, relevant stakeholders strengthened based on assessments and trainings conducted as per training calendar;
• Documentation of training programmes, state level good practices on GRB;
• Timely compilation and submission of reports;
• All the information related to the assignment.

Competencies

Core Values / Guiding Principles:

Integrity:

• Demonstrate consistency in upholding and promoting the values of UN Women in actions and decisions, in line with the UN Code of Conduct.

Professionalism:

• Demonstrate professional competence and expert knowledge of the pertinent substantive areas of work.

Cultural sensitivity and valuing diversity:

• Demonstrate an appreciation of the multicultural nature of the organization and the diversity of its staff. Demonstrate an international outlook, appreciating difference in values and learning from cultural diversity.

Core Competencies:

Ethics and Values:

• Demonstrate and safeguard ethics and integrity.

Organizational Awareness:

• Demonstrate corporate knowledge and sound judgment.

Work in teams:

• Demonstrate ability to work in a multicultural, multi ethnic environment and to maintain effective working relations with people of different national and cultural backgrounds.

Communicating and Information Sharing:

• Facilitate and encourage open communication and strive for effective communication.

Self-management and Emotional Intelligence:

• Stay composed and positive even in difficult moments, handle tense situations with diplomacy and tact, and have a consistent behaviour towards others.

Conflict Management:

• Surface conflicts and address them proactively acknowledging different feelings and views and directing energy towards a mutually acceptable solution.

Continuous Learning and Knowledge Sharing:

• Encourage learning and sharing of knowledge.

Functional Competencies:

• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude;
• Demonstrates good oral and written communication skills;
• Focuses on impact and result for the partners and responds positively to feedback.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Master’s Degree in Social Sciences/Economics/Social Work /Gender Studies/Public Administration/Policy or related fields.

Experience:

• Minimum 5 years of experience at the national/state level working with development projects including hands-on experience of design, implementation and monitoring/evaluation of projects preferably on Gender Equality and Women’s Rights.
• Experience of working with national/ state governments; particularly on GRB is required. State specific experience will be preferable.
• Experience of undertaking budgetary/ policy analysis and capacity building of government officials is desirable.

Language:

• Proficiency in English;
• Good command over Hindi;
• Working knowledge of language of the State with proficiency in reading and writing.

Application:

Interested applicants should apply to this announcement through UNDP jobs site: jobs.undp.org

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications in one single PDF document:

• All applications must include (as an attachment) the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded http://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/about-us/jobs;
• Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment, please combine all your documents into one (1) single PDF document. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment;
• Applications received after the close date will not be accepted;
• Only short-listed candidates will be contacted.

Evaluation and Selection Criteria

Criteria for shortlisting of CVs will be based on the following assessment:

• Required Degree and Qualification (5 points);
• Expertise and Experience relevant to the assignment (10 points);
• Demonstrable experience on policy advocacy with the government and other stakeholders (5 points);

The evaluation process for selection of the candidate will be based on the following assessment:

• Written Test (30 points)
• Interview (70 points)

Please Note:

• For an assignment requiring travel, consultants of 65 years or more require full medical examination and statement of fitness to work to engage in the consultancy.
• Due to large number of potential applicants, only competitively selected candidates will be contacted for remaining steps of the service procurement process.

Note:

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women’s empowerment.