UN WOMEN Jobs - 73540- National Consultant: A Study to understand why wo

National Consultant: A Study to understand why women are leaving jobs in the Ready Made Garments (RMG) sector after some years of service and to understand whether there is a systematic reduction in women’s composition in RMG labour force

Advertised on behalf of

UN WOMEN

Location :

Dhaka, BANGLADESH

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

15-Aug-2017

Application Deadline :

05-Aug-17 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

National Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

03 Months

Languages Required :

Expected Duration of Assignment :

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

The Bangladesh Ready-Made Garment industry has become the second largest in the world and is the key driver of the Bangladesh’s economy. RMG exports totalled $28.09bn (2015-16) with a 10.21% growth from the previous year accounting for over 80% of the nation’s export earnings and employing an estimated 4 million workers, majority of whom are women, in over 3,600 export oriented RMG factories. This occupation of women in the RMG sector has been instrumental in their economic empowerment and in improving their social – economic status. However, over the last few years, it is observed that female garments workers entering their jobs as young adults, are leaving their garment-sector jobs at what would often be considered mid-career (aged around 40). Despite low wages, jobs at RMG sector helps women workers to provide supports to their individual families back home. It is quite perplexing as to why they leave their jobs and revert through their own choice to a possible unemployment situation and risk of poverty, especially in cases where they may turn out to be the main wage earner in their family.

Furthermore, the share of women workers in the RMG sector’s labour force is going down. It has been widely understood, though based on limited data a, that women made up around 80% of the labour force of the garments industries. Recent data, however, shows that a much lower percentage. A 2015 survey by Asian Centre for Development reported that there are 65% of workers in the RMG sector were women. In the factories under the ILO RMG programme (better work Bangladesh), it was found that 58% of the labour force consisted of women. All these data indicate that the number of female workers have reduced in the sector. The extent of the reduction in numbers and the factors including Occupational Safety and Health and gender specific matters if any behind this reduction are not well understood. There are also economic costs linked with this trend as these skilled women workers leaving the RMG sector creates a vacuum in availability of skilled workers that may contribute to a loss in overall productivity. At the same time, there may be low recruitment of new women workers contributing to the overall changes of labour composition in the RMG sector.

In this context, ILO and UN Women will commission a pilot study to have deeper insights including the scale of the situation. This empirical study will provide data to understand the current composition of the workforce by gender and age and help understand better the factors that are affecting whether women are recruited and how long they continue to work in order to undertake necessary steps including strengthening policy and legislative interventions.

The study will be undertaken as part of collaboration as per the MOU between ILO and UNWOMEN.

Objectives:

To identify and analyse the key factors and causes of female workers leaving the RMG sector after some years of service; and the socio- economic situation of those women workers after they left their jobs;
To arrive at a best estimation of the current composition of labour force disaggregated by gender and age in the RMG sector; and to do an in-depth analysis of the trends of the composition of the labour force, factors responsible for it and its consequences on the relative position of women and men workers in RMG sector.

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of the work and main responsibilities:

1.Develop a methodology to achieve the objectives of the study, taking into consideration:

Review of secondary sources of information including studies carried out by ILO and UN Women and other credible organizations to identify gaps that need to be addressed through primary data collection and inform the methods;
Appropriate sampling methods for quantitative and qualitative data collection, considering different types and sizes of factories and the need for findings to be representative of the sector and credible to all stakeholders;
Primary data collection will involve visits to work sites, community spaces and workers’ homes as needed;
Including quantitative methods to analyse the composition of the sector and qualitative methods to identify causal and contributing factors and the consequences of changes in composition;
Methods to identify former women workers to understand the experience of women who have left the sectors (for example a few in-depth case studies of women who have left the sector can be included);
Including Key Informant Interviews with UN Women and ILO constituents i.e. Ministry of Women and Children Affairs(MOWCA); Ministry of Labour and Employment, Bangladesh Employers Federation including BGMEA and BKMEA and National Coordination Committee for Workers Education and other ministries and institutions and organizations as appropriate;
Include interviews with factory management;
Ensure standards for informed consent and confidentiality for individual respondents;
Based on the agreed methodology, develop questionnaires or a set of questions or other data-collection protocols as needed to collect information from garment workers and for undertaking the different interviews/FGDs as primary sources of information. All data collection tools to be share with UN Women and ILO for review, pre-tested, and amended based on input and pre-test;
The consultant will clean all data, analyse the data and conduct additional interviews if required to complete missing or incomplete information. At the end of the assignment, all the filled in questionnaires along with the complete data base must be returned to ILO & UNWOMEN'
Draft report. Once the draft report is ready, the consultant will organize validation workshops for sharing of the report findings and incorporate feedback for finalizing the report;
During the consultancy assignment, the consultant may be required to periodically appraise and take guidance from the Technical Committee to be constituted for this purpose by ILO and UNWOMEN.

Deliverable :

1. Work plan and proposed methodology and an outline for the final report;
2.- Three in-depth case studies of ex RMG women workers;
- Filled in questionnaires along with the complete data base;
- Transcripts of FGDs and interviews held with different respondents;
- Records and minutes of different meetings.
3. A final report on completion of the study summarizing key findings, technical analysis and recommendations.

Competencies

Corporate 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

Education:

Good academic background with Masters degree in economics or social science.

Experiences

Experiences in statistical sampling methodologies;
Five years of high level research experiences on RMG sector and women worker’s issues;
Have sound knowledge and in-depth understanding on the social and gender issues of Bangladesh;
Have knowledge and understanding on international and national policies and conventions on women’s rights issues especially for the ILO and UN’s;
In-depth knowledge on the RMG sector, its dynamics and importance for Bangladesh economy;
demonstrated ability to build trust and communicate effectively with women and men at many different levels, from entry-level workers to senior managers and government officials;
Experience in working with UN specially with UN Women and ILO on the relevant issues is a strong advantage

Language:

Full computer literacy and fluency in English and Bangla – both written and spoken – are essential.

TRAVEL:

Based on UN WOmen travel policy ( if required).

Application Process:

Interested candidates are requested to submit:

Narrative consisting of
- Approach to this study (max 2 pages);
- Brief experiences in similar kind of research/studies (max 2 pages);
- CVs , P11 and cover letter;
A financial proposal based on deliverables.

All applicants must include (as an attachment) the CV, P11 and financial proposals. Applications without financial proposal will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment. “Personal History Form - P 11” which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/en/about-us/employme