National Consultant Lead Researcher: Piloting Study To enhance of Gender Equality Response during Sudan War- Case of Extracting Citizen identification documents for IDP’s Women & Girls with Disabilities,2024

Background

United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) strives to promote gender equality and women’s human rights, strengthen the implementation of gender-sensitive policy and legislation, and eliminate all forms of violence against women. UN Women is strategically positioned at both the national and provincial levels in moving towards the realization of gender equality and women’s empowerment. UN Women provides support to innovative initiatives that promote women’s human rights, with a special focus on their economic security, governance/ political participation, freedom from violence, as well as access to justice.

The eruption of the conflict on the 15th of April 2023 has led to massive displacement to neighboring countries and internally to Eastern states, Gezira, white and Blue Nile states, Halfa, and Dongola. Most displaced are women, children, and elders. The latest statistics of the CVAW unit have indicated that more than 60 rape and sexual violence cases have been reported in Khartoum and more than 200 cases were reported in Darfur. Most cases remained unreported and out of reach of concerned authorities. Livelihood and copying strategies are among the major challenges families and women face. The severe economic deterioration induced by the loss of productive means including the destruction of factories and businesses poses a threat to displaced women and those hosted by their relatives and unknown families on how to secure temporary/permanent coping strategies. The latest OHCHA statistics have indicated that 24 million of the population need humanitarian assistance, however, 17% of the population was covered. This huge gap in humanitarian assistance puts most of the population at risk of severe insecurity including lack of access to basic services and needs, specifically food insecurity.

At the onset of the conflict, many women, young women-led organizations, and initiatives have been engaged in supporting the people who fled their homes to different States. They have been actively engaged in delivering different goods and services to the affected population including women, girls, children, elders and People with disabilities.

Most IDPs who left their homes without taking with them the necessary documents including birth certificate, and ID and mainly the household with women & Girls with disabilities.  This would have caused a major challenge to them as it hinders their access to service, travel, and put them at a security risk of suspension, and detention.

UN Women  CO work towards end all forms of discrimination against all women and girls a cross Sudan states and especially for Women & Girls with disabilities;  Whether or not legal frameworks are in place to promote, enforce and monitor equality and non-discrimination on the basis of sex( Tier III) ; one of the source for the data to measure achieving this goal is Administrative data , also, one of these method can be citizen gender generated data is guided by concept of “leave no one behind” where the focus is on communities and populations which are likely to be excluded from service delivery and other development program. 

 UN Women grounded in the vision of gender equality and women’s empowerment is seeking to conduct piloting study in collection of citizen gender generated data - Case of Extracting Citizen identification documents focusing on women & girls with disabilities during Sudan War 2024.

                 For one month piloting study will be conducting in Sudan Kassala state as main sample aeras and sample from Northern state -Halfa Locality as comparison sample , with applying the citizen gender generated approach in determine sampling strategy and sample size for both quantitative and qualitative data;

It is against this backdrop that UN Women seeks to recruit qualified a lead researcher to undertake this piloting study is crucial in ensuring that quality data is collected, stored, analyzed and reported on during the war. On a national level, acquiring data from affected communities (IDP’s and host communities) will ensure that (i) they have been identified as in need of assistance; (ii) executing phase in humanitarian aid will be easily carried out knowing the level of assistance needed.

The consultant will be reporting to the WEE head of portfolio and will be supported by Gender Statistics Advisor who will serve as the primary contact for contractual and payment matters.

Duties and Responsibilities

Description of Responsibilities/ Scope of Work

Overall Objective

Present a comprehensive analysis of the situation of women with disabilities among displaced women, women from the host communities, and strengthen the using of citizen data approach; that provide support for humanitarian actors in delivering goods and services to the affected population, focusing on women & girls with disabilities during the war.

  The specific objectives of this study are:

• To identify specific needs, experiences, challenges, and coping strategies in regards of Sudan war.
• To identify specific needs, experiences, challenges, and coping strategies in regards of extracting citizen documents of women & girls with disabilities in compare to women & Girls, Boys & Men with disabilities, elders and IDP’s & host communities affected by current conflict;
• To generate key recommendations to inform gender responsive humanitarian response actors in Sudan, about women & girls with disabilities needs and challenges .
• The collected information is to help understand the relation and gaps between women& girls with disabilities and other vulnerable groups, and guide the planning of evidence-based interventions, which operationalization will be adapted to tight time frames, rapidly changing contexts, and insecure environments that often characterize humanitarian interventions.   

Duties and responsibilities of the Lead Researcher

The lead Researcher is expected to perform the following tasks:

• Work closely with UN Women team in developing the methodology of the study and in designing the data collection tools.
• collect the relevant secondary data for the desk review and the primary data from the targeted group in two selected areas.
• Support the process of the identification of the target host communities, and shelters.
• Supervise and manage the overall process of the primary data collection.
• Conduct interviews, focus group discussions (FGDs), and any other tools with targeted groups and stakeholders in close collaboration with the data collectors.
• Contribute to ideas regarding the management of data entry and analysis.
• Provide briefing on the results of the consultations, desk review, interviews and the FGD if needed.

Deliverables

The lead Researcher is expected to deliver the followings:

• Produce and submit an inception report 4 days after the start of the project with a detailed methodology showing data collection, methodology of data collection, data analysis, tools used in the data collection and sampling. In addition to the work plan and annexes including the questions of the tools used in data gathering (FGD, forms or check list, interviews with guided questions)
• Produce a draft report of the study in addition to power point presentation. The draft report should be inclusive of the following components:
  • Executive Summary
  • Introduction
    • Background and context
    • Purpose and Scope of the study
  • Methodology of the study
  • Key findings of the study.
  • Conclusions and key recommendations
  • ANNEXES including data collection tools and references.
• A final report incorporating the comments received by UN Women

 Consultant’s Workplace and Official Travel

This is a home-based consultancy. Any trips to other cities will be confirmed accordingly.

Competencies

Core Values: 

• Respect for Diversity 
• Integrity 
• Professionalism 

Core Competencies: 

• Awareness and sensitivity regarding gender issues 
• Effective Communication 
• Good time management.

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies:  

FUNCTIONAL COMPETENCIES: 

• Research and analytical skills.
• Skills in designing data collection tools.
• Excellent skills in managing data entry and analysis, ensuring accuracy and reliability of the collected information.
• Report writing skills.
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills.
• Delivery oriented and time management

Required Skills and Experience

Education and Certification:

• Minimum M.SC degree in statistics, gender, social sciences, or any other related discipline

Experience:

• Expertise in gender-related aspects.
• At least 7 years of experience in working on gender issues or related fields;
• At least 7 years’ experience in conducting research, mapping, and assessments.;
• Strong writing skills; and
• Sound knowledge of women with disabilities issues is desirable.

Languages:

Fluency in English and Arabic is required.

How to Apply:

• Personal CV or P11 (P11 can be downloaded from: )
• A cover letter (maximum length: 1 page)