Gender Specialist

A. About Asian Disaster Preparedness Center

ADPC is an autonomous international organization with a vision to reduce disaster and climate risk impacts on communities and countries in Asia and the Pacific by working with governments, development partners, international organizations, NGOs, civil society, private sector, media, and other key stakeholders.

Established in 1986 as a technical capacity-building center, ADPC has grown and diversified its expertise across social and physical sciences to support sustainable solutions for risk reduction across a broad range of specialist areas. With over 100 staff from 19 different nationalities and a wide range of professional expertise from atmospheric scientists to social scientists with experiences from all levels of engagement typically required for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and Climate Resilience (CR) in an effective manner. ADPC is a competent regional resource center and has seven thematic departments: ADPC Academy, Risk Governance, Climate Resilience, Urban Resilience, Health Risk Management, Preparedness for Response and Recovery, Geospatial Information. These are supported by Finance, Human Resources and Administration, and Strategic Planning departments. In addition to the departments, ADPC works on three cross-cutting themes: Gender and Diversity, Poverty and Livelihoods, and Regional and Transboundary Cooperation through permanent working committees.

ADPC Strategy 2020 guides the organization in providing comprehensive risk reduction support to countries and communities in Asia and the Pacific. ADPC recognizes the importance of examining the linkages between disaster risk management, poverty reduction, gender equality, sustainability, rights-based approaches, climate change and regional cooperation.

For details please refer to ADPC website at http://www.adpc.net/

B. Background

Disasters take a huge toll on the development agenda of SAR countries. Between 2000 and 2017, disasters in South Asia incurred estimated damages of US$ 149.27 billion. Public expenditure is under stress by the repeated need to reallocate capital budgets away from long term development planning and towards reconstruction activities in post-disaster environments. For example, since 2005, Pakistan has suffered losses on the order of US$ 16 billion due to natural disasters. In Bangladesh, 2007 Cyclone Sidr resulted in damages and losses of US$1.7 billion, or 2.6 per cent of GDP.

To increase resilience and achieve climate commitments, there is a need for a transformational shift towards policies and institutions that enable climate resilient investments. Investing in more resilient infrastructure is both profitable and urgent as disruptions are extremely costly for governments, households, private sector and large ongoing investments in infrastructure assets will have long-lasting repercussions as poor maintenance, and natural disasters result in a vulnerable stock.

With the financial support from the World Bank Group, ADPC has been implementing a five-year project, titled “Climate Adaptation and Resilience Project for South Asia” (CARE). The project aims to create an enabling environment for climate resilience policies and investments across South Asia. This objective will be achieved through enhanced regional cooperation and knowledge exchange for climate resilience and adaptation and mainstreaming of resilience and adaptation in national policies, plans and investments.

Gender mainstreaming is vital to achievement of the project objectives. Gender component involves planning, implementation and monitoring of gender and inclusion across the project activities. Accordingly, a highly qualified and experienced Gender Specialist Consultant will be required in Pakistan to provide technical support to the component.

The objectives of this consultant position are to:

• Support gender mainstreaming across sectors and policies;
• Support planning, implementation and monitoring of gender and inclusion related activities under the component;
• Support capacity building initiatives across sectors in Pakistan.

C. Statement of Intent

The Gender Consultant will play an essential role in Pakistan to provide support with regards to policy review, capacity building and other activities across sectors from gender perspective. The Consultant will ensure quality and timely delivery of in-country activities and outputs. S/he will liaise with government agencies and other Pakistan-based stakeholders. The Consultant will be working on implementation and/or monitoring of the component activities in Pakistan, as required. The Consultant will coordinate the in-country capacity development activities. The Gender Specialist will be home-based in Pakistan.

Note:

It is not the intent of this Terms of Reference to cover every aspect of the position requirements, rather to highlight the most important areas of personal and joint responsibilities.

D. Duties and Responsibilities

The Gender Consultant will be responsible for:

• Supporting gender mainstreaming across agriculture and water sectors and policies in Pakistan;
• Reviewing key sectoral policy documents of agriculture and water sectors to assess the gender landscape in relation to climate-resilient development;
• Coordinating consultations, focus group discussions, forums, surveys, as necessary, to collect and share information for gender component of CARE for South Asia project;
• Providing support to capacity needs assessments and trainings for gender mainstreaming in agriculture and water sectors;
• Supporting in-country capacity development activities on gender and climate change;
• Undertaking field missions, as necessary;
• Drafting reports, documents, knowledge products and other communication materials focusing on gender aspects of project activities;
• Liaising with in-country stakeholders ranging from government and non-government sectors for effective implementation of project activities;
• Performing other relevant tasks as assigned by the supervisor

E. Qualifications

• Advanced degree in gender and development studies, social sciences, anthropology or a relevant field;
• A minimum of 7 years of professional experience of working in the area of Gender and at least 5 years of experience in gender and agriculture, water and climate change; climate change and/or disaster risk reduction;
• A minimum of 4 years of professional experience of working in Pakistan;
• Well-versed in gender analysis of policies, strategies, plans and similar documents analysis of gender-oriented policies and strategies;
• Excellent knowledge of mainstreaming gender equality in programs, especially in DRR and CR;
• Excellent understanding of current discourse related to gender and inclusion in DRR and CR;
• Demonstrated understanding of climate policies, frameworks and other obligatory and non-binding agreements relevant to CR;
• Excellent understanding of current discourse related to mainstreaming gender and inclusion in agriculture and water sectors;
• Demonstrated understanding of agriculture, water and climate related policies, frameworks and other obligatory and non-binding agreements;
• Demonstrated experience of successfully carrying out similar assignments;
• Excellent English proficiency in oral and written communication, including a demonstrated track record in technical report writing and ability to communicate technical matters effectively to a variety of audience.;
• Native level fluency in Urdu language;
• Excellent research and analytical skills and capacity to work under pressure and short deadlines;
• Proven experience of coordinating training, capacity building and facilitating technical discussions;
• Ability to undertake field missions, including coordinating field-based research activities;
• Ability to work amongst a diverse group of staff and partners;
• Proficient on Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Microsoft Teams and skilled at organizing online meetings.

G. Reporting Relationships

The Gender Consultant (Pakistan) will report to the Project Director. The technical oversight will be provided by the Senior Specialist Gender and Inclusion based at the Bangkok office through the Project Implementation Unit (PIU). The consultant will also coordinate with the other CARE project specialists and staff at national levels to carry out different activities under the project.

H. Contract Duration

The contract duration will be for six months.

I. Selection Method

The consultant will be selected in accordance with ADPC’s recruitment process and in compliance with the World Bank Procurement Regulations.

How to apply

Interested Candidates can submit the completed ADPC application form, resume, copy of degrees/certificate(s) together with a cover letter to: adpcjobs@adpc.net

Female candidates are especially encouraged to apply.

ADPC encourage diversity in its workplace and support an inclusive work environment.