Fiji: National Consultancy, Women’s Resilience to Disasters (Fiji Nationals Only)

Nov 9, 2022 | UN Women
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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.

The Fiji Multi Country Office (MCO) covers 14 Pacific countries, with field offices/presence in 6 countries, and six ‘focus countries’ (Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Tonga and Samoa). Each field presence is led by a national Country Programme Coordinator with a Programme Officer in Tonga. UN Women, in partnership with Pacific Islands Governments, regional organizations, CSOs, donors and UN agencies, focuses on delivering within four interlinked programme areas:

• Women’s Political Empowerment and Leadership (WPEL)
• Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE)
• Ending Violence Against Women and Girls (EVAWG)
• Gender and Protection in Humanitarian Action (GPiHA) and Disaster Risk Reduction

 Women’s Resilience to Disaster (WRD) 

Disaster risks converge with critical socio-economic vulnerabilities, environmental degradation and climate change making the Pacific a disaster hotspot.  Disasters and climate change are widening inequalities and undermining poverty reduction in the region.  Threats such as COVID-19 are further exacerbating the inequalities and hardships faced by women and girls including those with disabilities.  Women and girls face greater vulnerability and exposure to disasters, yet women remain largely ignored and their capacities unleveraged in conventional resilience building processes. As a result, women are generally absent in the development of resilience strategies and decision-making processes for prevention, preparedness, and recovery. This is compounded by significant gaps at the global, regional and country level in relation to the availability and use of sex, age and disability disaggregated data (SADDD), knowledge sharing on women’s resilience; an enabling environment for building women’s resilience (including capacities, leadership and funding); translation of commitments into action; coordination and private sector partnership; and a need for transformative change to tackle the underlying drivers of disproportionate risk.

UN Women’s WRD programme proposes a comprehensive package for building women’s resilience to disasters, climate change and threats (including COVID-19).   The aim of the WRD Programme will be to render women’s and girls’ lives and livelihoods disaster-resilient, contributing to sustainable and secure communities, by promoting gender responsive prevention, preparedness, and recovery systems, plans and tools; and by enabling targeted action to help women and girls withstand hazards and threats, recover fully from disasters and increase their resilience to future risks.  The expected end-of-programme outcomes (EOPOs) are:

• Prevention, preparedness and recovery systems, plans and tools are gender-responsive through women’s leadership in DRR, women’s enhanced influence in DRR decision-making, enhanced gender capacity of DRR and climate resilience stakeholders, increased access to knowledge, guidance and expertise on gender-responsive disaster resilience, and strategic partnerships and networks for women’s agency and leadership in DRR; and 

• Women and girls are prepared to withstand natural hazards, climate change and COVID-19, recover from disasters and increase their resilience to future risks, through gender-responsive early warning systems, gender targeted and mainstreamed services for women’s resilience, women’s informal and formal climate and disaster resilient businesses, women’s increased access to climate and disaster resilient livelihoods and strategic partnerships for resilient livelihoods.

Objectives of the assignment

UN Women Fiji MCO is looking for an individual to support the WRD Fiji Component work plan through building on existing and ongoing activities led by the National Disaster Management Office (NDMO). For this purpose, the Consultant will work under the overall coordination of the Permanent Secretary responsible for the National Disaster Management and the  Director of NDMO, Ministry of Rural and Maritime Development and under the direct supervision of the WRD Fiji National Programme Coordinator. 

The National Consultant is to seek guidance from UNDRR,  local, national, regional and international organizations of persons with disabilities (OPDs) to ensure best practices and processes for including persons with disabilities are informing all activities carried out under this consultancy. The consultant will work closely with the UN Women National WRD Team and will be seconded to work under the National Disaster Management Office, Ministry of Rural and Maritime Development.

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of Work/Duties and Responsibilities

The National Consultant will work in the following technical areas:

• Assist NDMO to develop a gender, disability and social inclusion mainstreaming supplement to National Disaster Risk Reduction Policy (NDRRP) to guide how the gender, disability and social inclusion principles should be mainstreamed and implemented in practice.

• Assist NDMO with validation of specific indicators on gender, disability and social inclusion for the NDRRP Monitoring and Evaluation System. Validation of indicators should involve engagement with Disaster Service Liaison Officers (DSLOs) to ensure proposed gender and social inclusion indicators are aligned with respective sectoral programs and existing M&E Systems. Validation process should also involve determining the final wording of the indicators based on discussion with DSLOs. This activity should include gathering of baseline data for gender, disability and social inclusion indicators and populating the NDRRP M&E system. In order to support the uptake of the Inclusive Indicators and promote NDRRP M&E tool, the consultant should roll out a workshop planned together with the NDMO, UNDRR Global Gender Focal Point, organizations of persons with disabilities, and the Ministry of Women. The objectives of the workshop would include: (1) presentation of the final version of the gender, disability and social inclusion indicators, (2) presentation of the findings of the baseline data, (3) to train Disaster Service Liaison Officers (DSLOs) on how to conduct gender analysis for their respective programs, (4) socialize the M&E system. Workshop should include training modules introducing concepts of ‘universal design’ and ‘cross-sectionality’.  Consultant should develop a workshop report with key findings and recommendations on the way forward.

• Assist NDMO to review the Humanitarian Policy and ensure it is gender-and disability responsive and inclusive. Consultant is to review the Humanitarian Policy through the gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) lens to focus on support and interventions at all levels by considering the unique needs of all people and structurally excluded groups. Specifically, the review is to focus on: (1) Improve donor and government-level inclusion by intentionally including people with disabilities, women, older people and diverse SOGIESC in donor strategies and frameworks. (2) Increase opportunities for people with disabilities, women, older people and diverse SOGIESC to access and actively participate in the services provided by the Government, development and humanitarian organisations. (3) Build organisational mechanisms and humanitarian coordination mechanisms to be inclusive of people with disabilities, women, older people and diverse SOGIESC.

• Consultant is to provide technical inputs towards Humanitarian Policy based on the review findings. Inputs should set out essential actions that humanitarian actors must take in order to effectively identify and respond to the needs and rights of persons with disabilities, women, older people and diverse SOGIESC who are most at risk of being left behind in humanitarian settings.

• Assist NDMO to formulate the Community Based Disaster Risk Reduction Policy and undertake a full gender and disability assessment of the plan to ensure it is gender- and disability responsive.

• Assist NDMO to review the Evacuation Centre SOP to include section on mechanisms for prevention, mitigation and support for survivors of gender-based violence in Evacuation Centres and temporary shelters. Consultant is to review the SOP through the gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) lens to focus on support and interventions at the community level by considering the unique needs of all people and structurally excluded groups. Consultant is to provide technical inputs toward the SOP based on the review findings.

• In an event of a Disaster, the Consultant will support NDMO with data analysis on gender issues and inclusivity.

Duration of the Assignment

The duration of this assignment will be from January 2023 i.e. 240 working days over a 12 months’ work assignment as per the schedule of deliverables.

For full details of this expectations, deliverables, and qualifications of the consultancy, please visit the link provided.