Terms of References:  

PRODUCING A GENDER STRATEGY FOR COTRAF-RWANDA AND ITS UNION MEMBERS

1.    Background 

 The Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) in partnership with the Congrès du Travail et de la Fraternité (Cotraf-Rwanda) is implementing a 3-year project funded by EU to foster social protection, social dialogue, minimum wages, and the respect of national and international labour norms in Rwanda_. The project is targeting three sectors: Mining, tea, and education. These sectors are simultaneously facing enormous challenges in terms of gender injustice, occupational safety, and low income. All three sectors are important for the Rwandan economy, especially when reflecting the needs of local and national solutions because the social dialogue on enterprise level is often not well developed neither in the tea nor mining industry. The working conditions are often poor and minimum standards of occupational safety are lacking. Those negative factors affect in general all workers but women (especially in the areas of tea and education) and children (mining) in particular

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For many years, in the Rwandan trade union (TU) movement questions of gender injustice have not been discussed. The gender audit report (2022) carried out in all trade union affiliated to COTRAF Rwanda stated that only 20% of women are in leadership positions and there is no female president of trade unions affiliated to COTRAF Rwanda. Besides the national policy of having 30 % of women in decision making is not respected in all syndicates at all levels.

The report showed that all audited syndicates do not have sexual harassment policies and gender mainstreaming is still taken as women’s issues only. Furthermore, the level of awareness of different types of GBV is very low and specific needs for women are not considered.

On the same note, the findings of the gender audit revealed that developing a gender strategy with a plan of action and monitoring and evaluation for COTRAF Rwanda and her member unions is a key to increase the number of females in the trade union structure, to create a safe working environment for women within trade union as well as to advocate for gender justice at the workplace.  This will also help to adopt a down – top approach in planning process that take into consideration gender responsiveness for both men and women at all levels.

It is against this background, FES and COTRAF Rwanda seek the service of a consultant or consortium of consultants (short-term) to elaborate a gender strategy document with the lengh of around 75pages, which will help COTRAF Rwanda and its individual unions to actively involve more women and young people in the union's work.  

The gender strategy will elaborate concrete policy recommendations to help COTRAF Rwanda and its individual unions to become more sensitive on questions of gender justice and actively involve more women in the union's work. The strategy will be an internal working document that will accompany a process for several years and it will be validated by TU representatives before use.

Key deliverables 

2.1 A Gender strategy document.  COTRAF-RWANDA, FES and TU representatives will provide comments on the draft and the consultant will finalize the Gender strategy in view of those comments.

2.2 A revised strategy will be validated by TU representatives  

3.3 Final strategy (Hard and soft copies should be in both editable and PDF versions) will be presented to FES and COTRAF-RWANDA. 

Reporting arrangements (Supervision and Collaboration)

 The consultants will report to COTRAF-RWANDA and work closely with FES for any inputs needed in developing the gender strategy content.

2.    Time Schedule

 The Gender strategy should be completed within a maximum of (15 Working days) from date of commencement. The consultant will provide a detailed time schedule for the task and delivery of the outputs. The schedule will be agreed upon by the two parties (consultant and FES& COTRAF-RWANDA). 

3.     Qualifications of the Consultant 

Master's degree or equivalent in gender/women's studies, peace and security studies, peace and development, human rights, social sciences, Sociology, or related field is required

4.     Required Skills and Experience

5.      Application process 

The short-term expert will submit an expression of interest to FES Rwanda at info@fes-rwanda.org and copy to cotrafrwanda2003@gmail.com, before 01^st June 2023 at 5PM. The expression of interest should include the following:

• Updated curriculum vitae that clearly spells out qualifications and experience in relation to this assignment.
• Contacts of 3 organizations that have recently contracted the consultant to carry out a similar assignment.
• Financial proposal for this assignment.

Please note that these (Financial shall be submitted to the designated email. While submitting your application be sure that your email subject line is EIDHR/ 2021/429/ 349 (Your Name)

Online submissions only are considered.   For any further information or clarification please contact us on at programmanager3@fes-rwanda.org

6.    Evaluation Criteria 

Experience of the consultant in similar assignment (40 points)

Qualification of the consultant (40 points) 

Financial proposal (20 points) 

Done at Kigali, on 18^th May 2023