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.

In 2015, on 25 September, the United Nations General Assembly adopted unanimously the Resolution 70/1 Transforming our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Gender equality and women’s empowerment is at the heart of the agenda, as numerous goals and targets address structural barriers to achieve equal rights and opportunities between women and men, girls and boys.

One of the key areas of concern is the economic empowerment of women. It is expressed in targets and indicators of SDG 5 (Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls) and SDG 8 (Promote inclusive and sustainable development, decent work and employment for all). Progress toward it depends not only on the adoption of a set of public policies by governments, but also on the existence of an enabling environment and active engagement of the corporate sector. This is also relevant to the achievement of SDG 1 (Poverty Reduction), SDG 10 (Reduced inequalities) and SDG 17 (Revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development).

UN Women - in partnership with the European Commission is implementing the regional programme “Promoting Economic Empowerment of Women at Work in Asia – WeEmpowerAsia” to contribute to the economic empowerment of women, recognizing them as beneficiaries and partners of growth and development, by increasing commitment of private companies to gender equality and women´s empowerment and strengthening companies’ capacities to implement these commitments. The programme will contribute to the achievement of gender equality through enabling women’s labour force participation, entrepreneurship, economic empowerment and thus their full and equal participation in society. The guiding platform will be the Women’s Empowerment Principles. The WEPs are a set of Principles for business offering guidance on how to empower women in the workplace, marketplace and community.

The WEPs offer a holistic framework to ensure the business practices create an enabling environment for women’s economic empowerment. Principle 5 of the WEPs calls for the implementation of enterprise development, supply chain and marketing practices that empower women, including:

• Expanding business relationships with women-owned enterprises women entrepreneurs.
• Supporting gender-sensitive solutions to credit and lending barriers.
• Enabling business partners and peers to respect the company’s commitment to advancing equality and inclusion.
• Ending of all forms of violence against women and providing safe business practices through the supply chain.

Under the guidance of UN Women’s Business Sector Advisory Group, the WeEmpowerAsia Programme is undertaking a study to review & analyze Gender-Responsive Procurement by Corporate India. The Research Consultant will play a critical role in supporting the Units in various function of this ongoing research study.

The consultant will work under the overall supervision of the Monitoring and Evaluation Lead and in close coordination with the Country Programme Manager- WeEmpower Asia

Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Unit is a cross cutting unit which leads and provides technical support to the programmer units in developing and implementing monitoring processes across the portfolios and undertaking various research studies cross cutting issues.

Public procurement spending represents 15-30% of GDP in countries. Corporate procurement offices manage an average of 64% of a company’s total enterprise spend. The value of these contracts add up to billions of dollars of market opportunities in each country, and trillions of dollars world-wide. However, procurement is not gender neutral.  It is estimated that women-owned businesses only benefit from 1% of procurement contracts.

The proposed study attempts to review & analyze gender responsive procurement by Corporate India, identifying challenges and opportunities to strengthen women owned business through linkages with corporate supply chains linkages.

The objectives of this study are as follows:

• Review the commitments of Indian Corporates towards gender responsive procurement, while analyzing the achievement of these commitments.
• Identify processes and policies adopted by Corporates in India to encourage gender responsive procurement.
• Evaluate the challenges and barriers preventing the successful implementation of gender responsive procurement.
• Provide recommendations to strengthen women owned businesses by increasing the adoption of gender responsive supply chain by corporate India.

Scope of the study:

Focusing on key corporate executives responsible for procurement decisions including COO/Supply Chain executives/Purchase Managers, the following will be undertaken:

• Quantitative Survey:  The survey will be sent to the top companies with a minimum annual turnover of INR 1000 Cr/procurement budget INR 250 crores, focusing on those listed on the BSE and NSE, MNCs operating in India and PSUs. It is expected the survey will cover responses from 150-175 corporates across size, geography, and sectors. 
• Qualitative Interviews: 20 in-depth, one-on-one interviews will be conducted with key stakeholders and decision makers involved in procurement, to get an in-depth understanding of the Corporate’s procurement policies and identify best practices.
• Focus Group Discussions/ Webinars – Overall 3-5 focus group discussions/webinars, reaching out about 50 women owned business who are interested in/currently part of corporate supply chains will be held to understand their perspective on supply chain linkages.

Duties and Responsibilities

The assignment entails following roles and responsibilities:

• Support in overall execution of the research study;
• Support the desk research and review of relevant literature;
• Support data collection activity, including reaching out to partners to ensure completion of surveys;
• Undertake qualitative interviews;
• Moderate Webinars/FGDs;
• Collaborate with the research team to record, collate and analyse qualitative and quantitative data;
• Support drafting of findings and recommendations;
• Contribute to the preparation of articles on research outcomes;
• Any other work as assigned by the supervisor.

Deliverables:

• 5 qualitative interviews conducted, and 1 Webinar/ Focused group discussion organized: By 15th November 2020.
• Draft research report within 2 weeks of completion of data collection: By 30th   December 2020.
• Presentation highlighting key findings and recommendations of the study developed: By 20th January 2021.

Competencies

Corporate Competencies:

• Demonstrates commitment to UN Women’s mission, vision and values;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Functional Competencies:

Knowledge Management and Learning:

• Shares knowledge and experience;
• Actively works towards continuing personal learning, acts on learning plan and applies newly acquired skills.

Development and Operational Effectiveness:

• Ability to perform a variety of specialized tasks related to design, planning and implementation of programme, managing data, reporting;
• Ability to provide input to and use new IT based systems.

Leadership and Self-Management:

• Focuses on result for the client and responds positively to feedback;
• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude;
• Remains calm, in control even under pressure;
• Demonstrates openness to change and ability to manage complexities;
• Good understanding of gender and development in South Asia;
• Demonstrable ability to work in a team;
• Ability to work under pressure;
• Good writing and communication skills;
• Excellent computer literacy and skills.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Masters’ degree in Gender and Development Studies, or any Social Sciences.

Experience:

• Minimum 2 years’ experience of working on development projects particularly in the context of enterprise development, MSMEs and supply chains as well as related policies.
• Knowledge of gender issues pertaining to women enterprises.
•  knowledge of mainstreaming gender equality into policies/programming/development.
• Previous experience with research for International Agencies including the UN System is desirable.
• Sound understanding of human rights-based approaches.

Desired skills and experience:

• Excellent analytical skills and prior experience of both quantitative and qualitative data analyses;
• Facilitation skills, particularly design of qualitative and stakeholder consultations;
• Working knowledge of gender and sex disaggregated statistics would be an asset;
• Excellent analytical skills and communication skills;
• Good writing skills and the ability to explain technical terms in a non-technical language;
• Previous exposure to gender related projects, qualitative and quantitative data analysis.

Language:

• Strong written skills in English and good command over Hindi as medium of communication.

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:

• Writing Samples (20 points)
• Interview (80 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.