National Consultant on Advocacy Training for women and girls living with HIV/AIDS

Contract

This is a National Consultant contract. More about National Consultant contracts.

Background

UN Women, the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women has been created to accelerate up the process of meeting the needs of women and girls across the world. As a part of the UN reform agenda, it brings together resources and mandates which will subsequently have a lasting impact on the whole community. UN Women Programme Office in Tajikistan works towards selected Development Results in the impact areas of combating violence against women, supporting the women, peace, and security agenda, working to empower women living with HIV. Furthermore, UN Women works on achieving Organizational Results focusing on strategic normative, partnership and coordination activities. Under these results, UN Women is working with different Government and civil society partners and with the UN agencies in support to addressing the national gender equality priorities and addressing stereotypes and patriarchal norms leading to women’s vulnerability and unequal position in the society.

UN Women has a great experience in implementing projects to support women living with HIV (WLWH), who struggle with stigma and exclusion, aggravated by lack of respect of their human rights. It must be noted that, stigmatization and discrimination trigger a wide range of human rights abuses for which the great majority of women living with HIV have not sought justice. In particular: discrimination based on real or perceived HIV status; violations of the right to medical privacy; forced HIV testing; barriers to employment based on HIV status, denial of education and child adaption based on HIV status or having HIV in the family; discrimination in gaining access to medical care; and lack of access to justice. Women widowed by AIDS or living with HIV face property disputes with in-laws, complicated by limited access to justice to uphold their rights.

Non-discrimination of women living with HIV and women from the affected populations is one of the priorities of the country agenda today. The issues of non-discrimination, the growing number of HIV infections and the vulnerability of women and girls to this disease are also closely monitored by the community as part of the SDGs. UN Women will promote changes in discriminatory laws and policies for women living with HIV and through national and international mechanisms with support and participation of women living with HIV in all processes. Consequently, WLWH need to enhance their advocacy capacities to engage constructively with the Government in combating HIV stigma and discrimination by advocating for their rights and policy change.

UN Women started a new phase of UBRAF projects with an overall objective to address Gender Inequalities, strengthening HIV/AIDS Programming for women and girls and creating an enabling environment for ensuring social justice. Advocacy training has been planned to develop a group consist of 30 effective advocates/WLWH with strong integrity, who are open to learning and able to take the lead in bringing about change and transformation in society.

In this regard, UN Women plans to hire a National Consultant for the required technical support in conducting two days advocacy training for women living with HIV to enhance their knowledge and skills in lobbying for change towards HIV stigma and discrimination as well as their engagement in policy and legislative processes at national and local levels.

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the direct supervision of the UN Women Country Programme Manager, the National Consultant will be responsible for the following:

• Preparation of the detailed work plan, including the methodology of work in close coordination with UN Women Programme Office in Tajikistan.
• Conducting a short need assessment exercise with the selected participants.
• Designing the two-days training content and module focusing on the knowledge, experiences, perspectives and needs of the participants, for 30 women and girls living with HIV in Dushanbe.

• Facilitate the two-days advocacy training for women living with HIV in Dushanbe and:

• Providing a deeper understanding of advocacy, its basic concepts, and the role of the participants as advocates in enhancing their respective efforts.

• Developing competencies on advocacy issue identification, strategic planning, implementation of advocacy and advocacy campaigns and its M&E system and tools.
• Using participatory and interactive tools to ensure maximum involvement of the participants.

• Creating opportunities for the participants to participate actively not only as learners but also as facilitators.

• Deliver training with focus and practical examples to demonstrate the following:

• Basics of Lobbying, policy analysis and advocacy in relation to WLWH rights and HIV stigma and discrimination.

• Evidence based advocacy with specific focus on WLWH.

• Influencing planning processes at local and national levels.

• Develop understanding of the participants about:

• The obstacles and opportunities involved in advocacy and campaigning.

• The role of the media as a key player in advocacy and campaigning.
• The process of policy intervention and exploring ways of introducing new policy through advocacy.

• Evaluating of the course in line with the training objectives and the expectations of the participants.

• Prepare and submit final report with description of the main results, next steps, and recommendations on promotion of the rights of women and girls living with HIV/AIDS.

Competencies

Core Competencies:

• Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues
• Accountability
• Creative Problem Solving
• Effective Communication
• Inclusive Collaboration

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies: http://www.unwomen.org/-/media/headquarters/attachments/sections/about%20us/employment/un-women-employment-values-and-competencies-definitions-en.pdf

Functional Competencies:

• Possesses the ability to work independently, under pressure and meet deadlines;
• Good knowledge of technical area;
• Good organizational skills and ability to pay close attention to detail;
• Experience in report writing.

Required Skills and Experience

Qualifications:

Education:

• Advanced university degree in Gender or Development Studies, law, Sociology, Social Work, humanities and social sciences or another related field.

Experience:

• At least 5 years’ experience in development issues, programming, gender equality, social work or other closely related fields;
• At least 3 years of practical experience in working with women and men with HIV and AIDS;
• A minimum of 3 years of experience in facilitating trainings on gender mainstreaming and HIV and AIDS including training on advocacy;
• Experience working with international organizations, NGOs, UN organizations or other development assistance actors is an advantage.

Knowledge of languages:

• Proficiency in written and oral Tajik, Russian and English is required.

Other:

• Good computer skills in Windows environment, knowledge of internet communications and command of MS Office applications (Word, Excel, Power Point).