Antecedentes

The United Nations in Bangladesh has recently finalized its United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF 2022- 2026). The UNSDCF upholds the principle of gender equality and women’s empowerment, through a twin track approach where gender is integrated across all strategic priorities, and is also prioritized under Strategic Priority (SP)  5 on Gender Equality and Ending Gender-Based Violence: Empowering Women and Girls where the outcome states that by  2026, more women, girls and sexual minorities benefit from an environment in which they are empowered to exercise their rights, agency and decision-making power over all aspects of their lives and towards a life free from all forms of discrimination, violence and harmful norms and practices.

Under UNSDCF’s SP5 and to respond to the 8th Five-Year Plan  priorities on gender equality and elimination of gender-based violence, the UN will focus on two interrelated strategic approaches: (i) Strengthen the capacity and accountability of institutions across public and private sector and government at national and local levels to develop and implement laws, policies and programmes that promote gender equality, eliminate GBV and address structural barriers that prevent women, children and girls  from exercising their human rights across sectors in a coordinated manner and; (ii) Support civil society and the women’s movement to enjoy expanded political space to effectively represent women and girls, particularly the most marginalized, and drive policy and social change for the promotion of gender equality and elimination of GBV. 

Outcome 4 under the Strategic Priority on Transformative, Participatory and Inclusive Governance aims at more people, especially the most vulnerable, benefit from more equitable, non-discriminatory, gender-responsive, participatory, accountable governance and justice, in a peaceful and tolerant society governed by the rule of law.

The UN will support review and strengthening of institutional mechanisms, capacity and coordination across the government and public institutions to effectively implement the existing gender-responsive planning and budgeting mechanism, gender statistics, access to justice, legal, rules, policy and programmatic frameworks to promote gender equality in relation to the National Women Development Policy 2011 and its Action Plan. Where necessary, it will also support the development of new policies and action plans in line with international and national commitments including CEDAW and other human rights treaties and the recommendations from the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, Addis Ababa Action Agenda (AAA) and Bangladesh’s 8th Five-Year Plan.

The UN plans to engage with senior leadership across Parliament and Government to strengthen political accountability and build ownership of the comprehensive, multi-sectoral and transformative approach needed to accelerate gender equality and prevent GBV. Specific attention will also be paid to promoting gender-responsive and non-discriminatory business practices amongst the private sector in Bangladesh.

Support will be provided for the strengthening of institutional arrangements and enhancing capacity to generate quality, comparable and regular disaggregated gender statistics to address data gaps, support evidence-based policy making and meet normative reporting commitments under the SDGs, CEDAW, CRC, UPR, Beijing Declaration and national plans. This will include data and statistics related to violence against women, gender equal distribution of unpaid care and domestic work, and women’s leadership and participation, among others. Institutional capacity strengthening will be supported for gender-responsive public finance management, financing framework for SDGs and planning through capacity building of line ministries and local governments to make strategic budget allocations through mainstreaming gender equality and women’s empowerment in planning and budgeting. Monitoring and measuring the impact of the gender responsive budget allocation will be strengthened.

The UN will focus on enhancing the ability of civil society actors and the women’s movement to participate in policy change for the promotion of gender equality and elimination of GBV and ensure accountability of duty bearers. This will include supporting development of a government mechanism where gender equality and women’s rights based CSOs have a key role in informing policy processes across sectors. The UN will engage and capacitate women, girls, and gender diverse rights holders, particularly those that face intersectional discrimination, and women’s organizations to participate in national and local consultative and decision-making processes. Using its facilitating role, the UN will support the creation of diverse networks of support for women leaders, working with professional networks, parliamentarians, CSO networks, social media networks, faith leaders, and youth groups. Support will be extended to CSO led platforms for their oversight role on the implementation of GE commitments, particularly to CEDAW, Beijing PfA and other normative frameworks.

Objectives:

Under the UNSDCF  and the coordination of the Gender Equality Thematic Group with the chairpersonship of UN Women and UNFPA, the UN agencies including UNICEF and UNDP are in the process of developing a Joint Programming Framework (JPF). The JPF will act as an umbrella framework to ensure strong coordination of gender-related initiatives in the UN’s collaboration with the Government of Bangladesh and civil society.  

The JPF plan currently consists of three separate but interrelated work streams; namely Gender Responsive Governance (GRG); Ending Gender-based violence (GBV); and Gender Responsive Care Economy.

The specific objective of the consultancy is to:

• Formulate a Gender Responsive Governance Programme as part of the Joint Programming Framework (JPF) in line with the priorities specified in UNSDCF and national laws and policies.
• To ensure coordination and synergies across the three JPF work streams, the national consultant will work with a team of consultants, across the different workstreams.

Deberes y responsabilidades

The consultancy has two main objectives:

1. Formulate a joint programme on GRG that is connected to the workstreams of Gender Responsive Care Economy and Gender Based Violence, with particular focus on gender responsive planning and budgeting, access to justice, gender statistics, and strengthening the normative framework for gender equality and empowerment of women.
2. Work closely with a team of consultants to contribute to the design of the overall Joint Programming Framework. This task will be completed under the supervision of an international consultant in charge of coordinating the whole Joint Programming Framework process, especially the linkages between GRG, GBV and care economy.

More specifically, the national consultant will be responsible for:

• Conduct a situation analysis of Gender Responsive Governance in Bangladesh.
• Conduct mapping of existing interventions on Gender Responsive Governance, draft implementation plan for Gender Responsive Governance programme formulation within the framework of broader joint programme framework including Gender Based Violence and Gender Responsive Care Economy.
• Coordinate and facilitate consultations with duty bearers and rights holders to design and validate Theory of Change and Logic Model for a Programme on GRG.
• Support the lead consultant in the designing the overall Joint Programming Framework on GRG, GBV and Gender Responsive Care Economy.
• Develop a full Programme proposal on GRG.

Expected deliverables:

Payment Milestone Linked with deliverables:

Respective deliverables and documents will be reviewed by UN Women before processing any payment.

Payment schedule is as followings:

Duration of the assignment: 60 Days spread between October to December 2021.

Duty station: Home based 

Supervision and performance evaluation: The national consultant will be work under the direct supervision of the Programme Analyst of GRG.

Travel and DSA: Being home based work there will be to travel and DSA. However, if unforeseen travel outside the duty station not required by the Terms of Reference is requested by UN WOMEN, and upon prior agreement/approval, such travel shall be UN WOMEN  expense and the individual contractor/SSA shall receive a per-diem not to exceed United Nations daily subsistence allowance rate in such other location(s).

Competencias

Functional Competencies

• Proven experience in developing and designing gender responsive governance related projects and programmes.
• Proven experience in developing results-based framework, PMF and Theory of Change.
• Experience in planning and facilitating high- level consultations, training, and participatory design with key stakeholders and UN agencies.
• Previous professional experience with the United Nations on similar issues.   

Core Competencies:

• Demonstrates integrity by modelling the UN’s values and ethical standards.
• Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of the UN.
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.
• Treats all people fairly without favouritism.
• Fulfils all obligations to gender sensitivity and zero tolerance for sexual harassment.

Habilidades y experiencia requeridas

Education:

• Master’s degree in social sciences, economics, public policy/administration, governance, gender studies or similar.

Technical Competencies:

• At least 10 years’ experience in issues related to gender equality and gender responsive governance
• Proven experience in programme formulation and resource mobilization.

Language Requirements: 

• Fluency in English and Bengali is required.
• Working knowledge of another official UN language is an asset.

Price Proposal and Schedule of Payments

Consultant must send a financial proposal based on Lump Sum Amount. The total amount quoted shall be all-inclusive and include all
costs components required to perform the deliverables identified in the TOR, including professional fee, only  and any other applicable cost to be incurred by the SSA in completing the assignment.
The contract price will be fixed output-based price regardless of extension of the herein specified duration. Payments will be done upon
completion of the deliverables/outputs and as per below percentages

Evaluation Method and Criteria:
Individual consultants will be evaluated based on the following methodology.

Cumulative analysis-

The award of the contract will be made to the individual consultant up on Cumulative Analysis/evaluation and determined as:
1. Responsive/compliant/acceptable; and
2. Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the
solicitation;
Only candidates obtaining a minimum 70 mark in technical evaluation will be considered eligible for financial evaluation.
Technical Criteria for Evaluation (Maximum 49 points out of 70)

Criteria-01; Educational Qualification and diversification - Max Point 10

Criteria-02; Number of years’ experience in issues related to gender equality and gender responsive governance. Proven experience in developing and designing gender responsive governance related projects and programmes- Max Point 25

Criteria-03; Proven experience in developing research methodologies, protocols, results-based framework, PMF and Theory of Change in the field of GRG.- Max Point 20

Criteria-04; Previous professional experience with the United Nations on similar issue.- Max Point 15

The total number of points allocated for the technical qualification component is 70. The technical qualification of the individual is evaluated based on following technical qualification evaluation criteria:

Only the candidates who have attained a minimum of 70% of total points (49) will be considered as technically-qualified candidate.

Interested candidates will submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications.
 

To be included as part of the proposal:

• Updated CV;
• Personal History Form(P11); which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/en/about-us/employment;
• Financial proposal: Propose the daily fees (per date BDT rate * 60 days).
• Examples of earlier 03 related previous work        

Only applications including all items mentioned above will be considered.

NOTE: Documents required before contract signing:

UN Personal History Form;
Full medical examination and Statement of Fitness to work and travel for consultants with travel involved. (This is not a requirement for RLA contracts);
Security Certificate BSAFE: EN: https://agora.unicef.org/course/info.php?id=17891
Individual subscribers over 65 years of age are required to undergo a full medical examination including x-rays at their own cost and obtaining medical clearance from the UN Medical Director prior to taking up their assignment;
Release letter in case the selected consultant is government official.
Only applications will all items mentioned above will be considered

Note: The individual consultant who does not meet the above eligibility criteria shall not be considered for further evaluation. Necessary documentation must be submitted to substantiate the above eligibility criteria