National Consultant to support the Beijing+30 Review and Universal Periodic Review in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Background

Grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, UN Women will work 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. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women will lead and coordinate United Nations System efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. It will provide strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

Since 2008, UN Women has been cooperating with the Agency for Gender Equality of Bosnia and Herzegovina (AGE BiH) on the promotion of gender equality and empowerment of women. In 2023, AGE BiH has been tasked to carry out the Beijing+30 review for Bosnia and Herzegovina. The previous review processes (Beijing+15, Beijing+20 and Bejing+25) have been carried out by AGE BiH, with technical support of UN Women. AGE BiH sees the review process as an opportunity for consultation and awareness-raising on the progress in the area of protection of rights of women and gender equality.

In 2025, the global community will mark the thirtieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women and adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (1995), and 10 years of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals. Leading up to the anniversary should be a comprehensive national-level review process led by the government that involves all stakeholders. Reviews should be inclusive and mobilize all branches and levels of government, civil society organizations, the private sector, the entities of the United Nations system and regional and international organizations, academia, the media and other stakeholders. This will ensure an inclusive, participatory, transparent and thorough review process at the national and sub-national levels, based on evidence, while also producing tangible lessons and solutions, which should be followed by concrete action and collaboration towards the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the SDGs.

This anniversary should be used as the occasion to engage more with the generation of gender equality advocates and to bring those who remain on the sidelines into the centre of a whole-of-government, whole-of-society effort. By joining forces, governments together with society have the capacity to overcome and eradicate the root causes of gender inequality and chart a path forward for genuine, substantive equality, with equal rights and equal opportunities for women and girls.

On the occasion of the thirtieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women, the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women will, in March 2025, undertake a review and appraisal of progress made in implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, and accelerate the realization of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls.

This anniversary is also the opportunity to strengthen gender-responsive action and implementation of the 2030 Agenda and other global commitments, such as those under Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) and subsequent resolutions on women and peace and security; the Addis Ababa Action Agenda of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development (2015); the Paris agreement on climate change (2015), and regional commitments to promote gender equality and women’s and girls’ rights, among others.

Accordingly, all States are called upon to undertake comprehensive national-level reviews of the progress made and challenges encountered in the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and of the outcomes of the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly held in 2000. In the review process AGE BiH plans to collaborate with relevant stakeholders at all levels on the preparations for the 2025 review in order to present the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina comprehensively, but also to benefit from their experience and expertise. AGE BiH aims to organize country wide consultations which will ensure that voices of women and men, girls and boys are included in this review process.

UN Women is committed to supporting the review process technically and financially, and for this purpose is seeking to employ a national consultant who will support the Beijing+30 country review. In parallel and based on the findings in the review process, consultant will also be tasked with drafting inputs to support the fourth cycle of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of BiH.

UPR is a unique process which involves a periodic review of the human rights records of all 193 UN Member States and is a significant innovation of the Human Rights Council which is based on equal treatment for all countries. It provides an opportunity for all States to declare what actions they have taken to improve the human rights situations in their countries and to overcome challenges to the enjoyment of human rights. The UPR also includes a sharing of best human rights practices around the globe. The fourth UPR cycle should focus on the implementation of accepted recommendations and the developments of the human rights situation in BiH that will be under review in the 48th Session of the UPR Working Group in January-February 2025. UN entities, including UN Women will include in their contributions information on the follow-up to the preceding review as well as on developments or relevant issues not addressed during previous reviews. UN entities will report not only on accepted recommendations falling within their mandate but also on noted recommendations.

, Beijing, 4–15 September 1995, chap. I, resolution 1, annexes I and II.

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Duties and Responsibilities

UN Women is seeking to recruit a national consultant to support the Beijing+30 Review and the 4th cycle Universal Periodic Review of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and produce the Beijing+30 Review report and inputs to support the UPR of BiH.

The immediate objective of this consultancy is to provide expert support in developing an analytical basis for the review process, including the methodology for public consultations and stakeholder validation, collecting and analyzing stakeholders’ inputs, drafting the reports and compiling the comments and recommendations into the final outputs.

TASKS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

Under the overall supervision of the Country Representative and direct supervision of the Governance and Leadership Coordinator, the national consultant is expected to perform the following tasks:

• Developing a workplan and methodology for the input collection and the structured consultations with the relevant stakeholders
• Desk review of the BiH progress based on the obligations stemming from the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action
• Organizing five stakeholder review workshops with representatives of gender institutional mechanisms, civil society organizations, and other relevant stakeholders to review the progress and come up with the recommendations
• Processing of data collected and final analysis with recommendations for the Beijing+30 Review Report
• Presentation of final draft of the Beijing+30 Review Report
• Facilitating consultations with relevant stakeholders to validate findings and recommendations
• Conducting additional research to support the 4th cycle Universal Periodic Review of BiH and drafting brief report (up to 5 pages) on behalf of UN Women

To facilitate delivery of the above outputs, UN Women will provide the consultant the following:

• Guidance note for comprehensive national-level Beijing+30 reviews
• UPR 4th Cycle information and guidelines for UN Resident Coordinators, UN Country Teams and UN entities’ written submissions to the UPR Compilation
• Other documents and inputs as required

DELIVERABLES  AND TIMEFRAME

The consultant will be expected to submit the following deliverables within the indicative timeframe:

The consultancy will last up to 32 consultancy days, in the period from 5 December 2023 to 31 March 2024. The assignment will not require presence on UN Women premises.

REPORTING

All deliverables should be submitted to the UN Women Governance and Leadership Coordinator in English unless agreed otherwise in the workplan. Approval time required to review the deliverables before authorizing payments is 7 days.   

Competencies

Core Values/guiding principles:

• Demonstrates integrity by modelling UN Women values and ethical standards.
• Demonstrates a commitment to UN Women’s mission and vision.
• Able to work effectively within a team.
• Displays cultural and gender sensitivity and adaptability.
• Able to multi-task and juggle competing demands.
• Can assess and prioritize work needs quickly.
• Able to relate to external partners, including other international organizations and agencies, NGOs, grassroots community groups, etc.

Core Competencies:

• Sound expertise in gender equality and women’s empowerment, including on women’s political participation.
• Advanced expertise in training curriculum design and development.
• Training facilitation experience in different countries.
• Broad knowledge of training techniques and tools.
• Good communication skills.
• Fluent in Microsoft word, excel, e-mail, web-based applications and databases.
• Demonstrated leadership and personal examples of promoting knowledge management and a professional learning environment.
• Outstanding networking, team-building, organizational and communication skills.
• Capacity to work with diverse partners including governments, donors and civil society.
• Ability to work effectively and harmoniously with people from varied cultures and professional backgrounds.Ability to produce well-written documents demonstrating excellent interpersonal communication skills.

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

Required Skills and Experience

Academic Qualifications:

• Master’s degree in Gender Studies, Political Science, Policy Studies, Sociology, Social Sciences, or related fields. Bachelor’s degree in the same area with additional 2 years of relevant work experience may be taken into consideration in lieu of advanced degree.

Skills and Experience:

• At least seven years of experience working as policy researcher/analyst in the fields of gender equality, political science, social sciences or related field.
• Strong understanding of gender and development demonstrated through track record of work relevant to the assignment (at least 2 previously implemented similar assignments).
• Demonstrated experience in working and collaborating with gender institutional mechanisms and civil society organizations and knowledge of legislative and institutional framework for gender equality.
• Previous experience working/consulting for international projects/programmes will be considered as an advantage.
• Fluency in English and B/H/S, excellent spoken and written skills.

EVALUATION OF APPLICANTS 

UN Women applies a fair and transparent selection process that takes into account both the technical qualification of potential consultants as well as the financial proposals submitted in support of consultant applications. Candidate applications will be evaluated using a cumulative analysis method taking into consideration the combination of applicant experience, qualifications, and a financial proposal. The contract will be awarded to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

• responsive/compliant/acceptable,
• and having received the highest score out of technical and financial criteria defined below.

Based on a desk technical evaluation, only candidates receiving a minimum of 50 points at technical evaluation will be considered for validation interview.  

Criteria: 

Technical Evaluation (70%) – 70 points

• Master’s degree in Gender Studies, Political Science, Policy Studies, Sociology, Social Sciences, or related fields. Bachelor’s degree in the same area with additional 2 years of relevant work experience may be taken into consideration in lieu of advanced degree. – SATISFACTORY/UNSATISFACTORY

• At least seven years of experience working as policy researcher/analyst in the fields of gender equality, political science, social sciences or related field. – 25 points
• Strong understanding of gender and development demonstrated through track record of work relevant to the assignment (at least 2 previously implemented similar assignments). – 25 points
• Demonstrated experience in working and collaborating with gender institutional mechanisms and civil society organizations and knowledge of legislative and institutional framework for gender equality. – 15 points
• Previous experience working/consulting for international projects/programmes will be considered as an advantage. – 5 points
• Fluency in English and B/H/S, excellent spoken and written skills. – SATISFACTORY/UNSATISFACTORY

Financial Evaluation (30%) – 30 points 

Evaluation of submitted financial offers will be done based on the following formula: S = Fmin / F * 30 

• S - score received on financial evaluation
• Fmin - the lowest financial offer out of all the submitted offers qualified over the technical evaluation round
• F - financial offer under the consideration. 

DOCUMENTS TO BE INCLUDED WHEN SUBMITTING THE PROPOSALS 

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents: 

1. Expression of interest and confirmation of immediate availability (cover letter)
2. Detailed financial proposal in BAM inclusive of all costs (which includes consultancy fees, travel expenses, accommodation etc.)
3. Completed UN Women Personal History (P11) form, that can be downloaded from  

Please note that incomplete applications will not be considered (all documents indicated above need to be uploaded). For any additional information, please contact unwomen.bih@unwomen.org 

How to Submit the Application: To submit your application online, please follow the steps below: 

• Download and complete the UN Women Personal History Form (P11)-  
• Merge your UN Women Personal History Form (P11), the Financial Proposal, and Expression of Interest into a single file; The system does not allow for more than one attachment to be uploaded
• Click on the Job Title (job vacancy announcement)
• Click 'Apply Now' button, fill in necessary information on the first page, and then click 'Submit Application' 
• Upload your application/single file as indicated above with the merged documents (underlined above)
• You will receive an automatic response to your email confirming receipt of your application by the system

Qualified women and men and members of minorities are encouraged to apply. UN Women applies fair and transparent selection process that would take into account the competencies/skills of the applicants as well as their financial proposals.  

At UN Women, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment of mutual respect. UN Women recruits, employs, trains, compensates, and promotes regardless of race, religion, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, ability, national origin, or any other basis covered by appropriate law. All employment is decided on the basis of qualifications, competence, integrity and organizational need. 

If you need any reasonable accommodation to support your participation in the recruitment and selection process, please include this information in your application. 

UN Women has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UN Women, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination.  All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to UN Women’s policies and procedures and the standards of conduct expected of UN Women personnel and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. (Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.)

Due to large number of applications we receive, we are able to inform only the successful candidates about the outcome or status of the selection process.