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.

Under its Strategic Note 2018-2023; PNG Country Office focuses on delivering programmes that are aligned to global norms, policies and standards under four thematic areas;

• Women’s leadership and political participation
• Women’s Economic Empowerment
• Ending Violence Against Women
• Women, Peace, Security and Humanitarian Actions

In PNG the overall labour force participation rate (% of total population ages 15+, modelled ILO estimate) was 47.3 per cent in 2017. Its highest value over the past 27 years was 72.53 in 2004. In 2020, the female labour force participation rate was 48.3 per cent, compared with 49.2 per cent for men. A critical factor in labour force participation and employment rates for women is their engagement in agriculture and fishing for household consumption in rural areas, where some 87 per cent of the population is concentrated.

UN Women is seeking to recruit a Women’s Economic Empowerment expert to support the organisation’s work on enhancing women’s participation and benefit in the economy. In particular, the job requires strong knowledge and experience in developing and implementing initiatives focussed on business development and women’s financial inclusion, women’s voice and agency, social protection, developing knowledge products, programming and policy support at national and subnational level.  It also requires supporting and developing mutually reinforcing partnerships with relevant regional bodies, Government counterparts, UN organizations, private sector entities, and CSOs.

The expert position will complement a locally engaged Programme team to ensure that UN Women’s contribution to the new United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework and UN Women’s new Strategic Note Strategic appropriately considers women’s economic empowerment in line with economic opportunities and dynamics in PNG. The position will also seek to strengthen the implementation strategy and approaches within ongoing projects such as the Safe and Prosperous Districts programme and the Markets Economic Recovery and Inclusion Program.  The expert will provide technical advice to the UN Women WEE Program Team on issues around strengthening programming within the Informal Economy, Social Protection, Business Development and Financial inclusion.

Scope of Work/Duties and Responsibilities         

Under overall guidance of the UN Women Country Representative and direct supervision by the Deputy Country Representative, the consultant will perform the following tasks and deliverables:

1. Provide strategic planning support to the Country Office on WEE.

• Based on the country context analysis, the review of the Medium-Term Development Plan III and government’s priorities within the MTDP IV, other existing economic analysis and existing evaluations, a stakeholders’ analysis and the gaps, propose women’s economic empowerment outcomes and partnerships for UN Women PNG Country Office’s new strategic note 2023-2027, in line with UN Women’s corporate strategy 2022-2025 and UN Women’s comparative advantage in the country.
• Support the integration of  women’s economic empowerment in the updating of the Common Country Analysis and the development of the United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF) including preparing of written inputs, PowerPoint presentations, etc.
• Participate in strategic planning meetings in UN Women, with other UN agencies as requested by senior management.
• Review and contribute to strategic planning documents.
• Provide technical assistance on how to build synergies between WEE and other thematic areas including through exploring UN Women’s area-based programming in the next strategic note.

2. Provide technical support to policy development

• Technical support and advice to the Department for Community Development and Religion (DfCDR) and other development partners on the drafting of the revised Informal Economy Policy and the Voice Strategy
• Lead in consulting DfCDR and relevant development partners to coordinate support towards the implementation of the Informal Economy Policy and the Voice Strategy  
• Provide inputs to key policy frameworks related to women’s economic empowerment ensuring the policies incorporate the norms and standards within relevant global and normative frameworks such as CEDAW, the Beijing Platform for action, ILO conventions and related SDGs.
• Provide guidance to subnational governments on the design and implementation of local government policy and plans for implementing the National Informal Economy Policy at the local level. The expert will provide technical support to UN Women team and local authorities to increase their awareness and capacity to implement the finalized policy.

3. Provide technical support for the programme implementation, monitoring and reporting for PNG’s Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) portfolio

• Provide technical advice on the development of systems, processes and mechanisms to support programme planning, implementation, monitoring and progress reporting.
• Lead in positioning UN Women PNG Country Office as a thought leader in women’s economic empowerment
• Support the drafting of programme reports for corporate reporting requirements and donor reporting based on the required schedules of quarterly and annual corporate reports and 6-monthly progress donor reports and final project reports, ensuring full alignment to results based reporting and donor requirements.
• Review and provide feedback to project/ programme strategies and documents, workplans, case studies and related knowledge products and publications, as needed.
• Draft policy documents, briefs and other strategic papers/ materials for the use in the development and presentation of policy and programmatic positions.

4. Provide capacity building support to country office team and partners

• Provide substantive technical and policy support (both virtual and missions, as requested) to UN Women country programme teams in developing and strengthening projects/ programmes to support the implementation of global norms and standards, ensuring use of effective approaches and tools for execution of training as requested.
• Provide programme implementation guidance, tools, and technical resources to improve the technical delivery of programme outcomes.
• Support UN Women to develop, implement and monitor capacity building initiatives on WEE for UN Women partners.
• Support UN Women partners and field-based staff to collect and analyze relevant data as required by the Monitoring, Evaluation, Learning and Reporting framework.

5. Support Resource Mobilization

• Lead preparation of knowledge products and briefs to add to the efforts for resource mobilization.
• Provide technical inputs into project design documents drawing on global best practices and knowledge of the local context and development priorities needs of PNG.
• Develop proposals for Safe and Prosperous Districts 3 and for scaling up MERI Phase 2, in line with the focus of the UN Women Strategic Note (2023-2027).
• Review and evaluate proposals and oversee the preparation of donor proposals.

Duration of the assignment

The total duration of the contract assignment will be 186 days, between June 2022 to June 2023. This assignment will require 126 days in Port Moresby inclusive of field visits to project sites and 60 days of home-based work.

Expected Deliverables

The consultant is expected to deliver the following results:

All the documents, including the interview tools, training materials and reports should be submitted in written in English language.

Upon receipt of the deliverables and prior to the payment of the instalment, the deliverables, related reports and documents will be reviewed by UN Women and approved within two weeks of submission.

Inputs

Transport:

UN Women will also cover the costs of daily subsistence allowance (DSA) for Port Moresby and other areas within the country as per standard UN rate, as well as the most direct economy airfare for missions, as per UN Women regulations, for all approved official travel. The Consultant is responsible for all international travel to Port Moresby and should include the costs in the financial proposal.

UN Women will provide transport in the field only, consultant is expected to arrange own transport within Port Moresby and from homebased to Port Moresby. This should be included in the financial proposal.

Communications:

The Consultant will be required to provide their own local communications such as SIM cards. Some internet access is available while in Port Moresby however the consultant is expected to arrange his/her own internet access in the field. These costs should be included in the lump sum fee of the financial proposal. 

Accommodation:

All accommodation costs and other living expenses will be covered within the consultancy fee. 

Security:

The consultant will be provided with a UN security briefing and will be required to follow UN security rules and guidance.

Insurance:

The Consultant will arrange private insurance and the cost of which will be included in the financial proposal.

Office space and facilities:

The consultant is expected to work remotely using her/his own computer and other means of communications but may access the UN Women office for printing of relevant documents or should he/she be required to work on-site at any point during the assignment.

Performance evaluation:

Contractor’s performance will be evaluated based on timeliness, responsibility, initiative, communication, accuracy, and quality of the products delivered.

Functional Competencies:

• Accountability
• Adaptability and Flexibility
• Building Trust
• Client Orientation
• Commitment and Motivation
• Communication
• Creativity
• Planning and Organizing

Critical Competencies for Immediate Response situations:

• Integrity, results orientation, teamwork, good inter-personal skills.
• Well-developed communication skills.
• Sound judgement, analytical skills.
• Flexibility, proactive engagement, innovation.
• Risk management, gender and culturally sensitivity.
• Ability to work under pressure and demonstrates high tolerance for change, complexity, and unpredictability.

Education

• Master’s degree in Economics or other related fields

Experience and Skills

• At least 10 years of experience of relevant work in the Women’s Economic Empowerment space
• Proven competence in qualitative and quantitative research, in the specific area of the informal economy. (Experience needs to demonstrate such competence.)
• Past experience in designing and implementing high quality research in Papua New Guinea or the Pacific.
• Knowledge of Papua New Guinea context or experience in the country or Pacific region would be advantageous.
• Experience working with national and district governments in Papua New Guinea
• UN Experience would be an asset

Language and other skills

• Good command of English both written and oral
• Ability to communicate in the local languages (Tok Pisin) would be an added advantage.
• Computer literacy and ability to effectively use office technology equipment, IT tools, ability to use Internet and email.

Submission of application

Interested candidates are requested to submit electronic application to the UNDP website not later than 25 May 2022 COB (PNG time).

Submission package

• CV
• Letter of Interest containing the statement on candidate’s experience in the field of recruitment
• Financial proposal. The financial proposal shall specify a total lump sum amount breaking down lump sum professional fee and international travel expenses (from the country of origin to Port Moresby and back), visa and other travel related costs and travel expenses within Port Moresby and the above local trips including travel expenses.

All applications must include (as an attachment) the CV and the financial proposal. Applications without financial proposal will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment.

Please note that only candidates selected for an interview will be contacted.