Terms of Reference for the Development of the National Women Council Five-Year Strategic Plan (2022-2027) and Updated the Women Empowernment Strategy
I. Introduction
National Women Council (NWC) was established by the Constitution of 2003, as amended to date; it is governed by Law No 27/2003 of 18/8/2003 and modified by Law No 02/2011 of 10/02/2011. Since its creation, the NWC operations relied on five-year strategic plans. The first generation of its strategic plan covers five years of 2009-2013; the second strategic plan was developed and implemented from 2015-2020 with slight extensions in 2020. Currently, NWC seeks to develop a five-year Strategy for 2021-2026, as a critical document that will define its areas of focus and goals. This follows the 2015–2020 Strategy during which NWC delivery increased its profile as a legitimate voice on women’s rights, women mobilization, and women’s empowerment, and women in governance, achieving significant success in many areas amidst many changes and challenges in that period.

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II. Rationale
In the proposed Strategic Plan, NWC will revisit its vision, mission, goals, and strategic objectives and propose the direction for the next strategic planning cycle running until 2026. NWC seeks to re-evaluate its primary stakeholders while staying true to the vision of using women’s voices and mobilization to advance a gender-responsive society in Rwanda and beyond. The new strategic plan seeks to reinforce NWC’s commitment and approach in addressing gender equality, women’s empowerment, and equity while exploring new ways of maximizing the role of stakeholders including civil societies, government, and private sector to amplify its initiatives. It is expected that the new strategic plan will help NWC to articulate its goals and priorities in order to be responsive and accountable to the social, political, and economic realities of women's and girls' lives today. To ensure that this work is well done and the process is inclusive, the NWC is expected to hire a consultant to facilitate the development of the strategic plan and its implementation plan with a budget.

III. Background
In 1995, while the country started the struggle of reconstruction, this coincided with the Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing in which Rwanda participated. The Conference focused on the cross-cutting issues of equality, development, and peace, and analyzed them from a gender perspective. The Government of Rwanda immediately initiated programs to implement the Beijing Declaration to enhance Women's participation in economic development. In 1996, the Government started “Imiyoboro y’Abari n’Abategarugori”. In 1999, under MIGEFASO’s instructions “Imiyoboro y’Abari n’Abategarugori” changed its name to Inzego z’Abari n’Abategarugori, also known as Structures Organisationnelles des Femmes (SOF). The SOF were the channels of mobilizing Women in different aspects especially economically where Women were requested to give their contribution as savings and whoever needed a loan, could get it from that structure.

In 2003, the SOF was expanded and renamed the National Women Council by the general assembly of 26/05/2003. In the Rwandan Constitution of 4 June 2003, as amended to date, Article 187 designated the National Women Council as an independent institution with legal personality, possessing both financial and administrative autonomy. The NWC was mandated to be a forum for advocacy and mobilizations on issues affecting Women in order to build their capacity and ensure their participation in the national development and the development of Women in particular.
The new strategic plan (2022-2027) should be articulated on the National Strategy for Transformation (NST1), the vision 2035, and 2050 and sectoral policies that include the National Gender Policy (2010) as revised in (2021), decentralization strategy, and others. In addition, the strategic plan should be built on the international gender instruments and global guidelines to which the government of Rwanda has committed too. Those include SDGs 5, 7, 11, etc.; Beijing plate form for Action (1995), CEDAW (1996), AU Agenda (2063), the Easter African Gender Equality Strategy, and others. Women empowerment strategy establishes three priorities that are key to be considered and these include; Enhancing women’s voice in decision-making and leadership; Promotion of women’s economic empowerment and Ending violence against women and girls.

VI. Objectives
The overall objective of this consultancy is to develop a five-year Strategic Plan incorporating women empowerment strategy to set clear and well-defined processes to empower women across all development sectors. The strategy defines the institutional framework and mechanisms within which women empowerment strategic interventions will be implemented, monitored, evaluated, and coordinated.

a) Specific objectives of the strategic plan incorporating Women empowerment strategy
• Review and analyze strategic plan for 2015-2020 and key documents with a focus to understanding more about NWC
• Define the strategic priorities and action plan and budget to achieve these priorities
• Conduct consultative forums with stakeholders
• Draft the Strategic Plan and present it to NWC and key stakeholders for validation and approval after necessary revisions.
• Identify critical gaps associated with women empowerment in all development sectors;
• Set clear measures to address women empowerment gaps and challenges faced by all categories of women;
• Guide institutional accountability through monitoring and evaluation of outcomes, outputs, and interventions of all contributing actors;
• Fully exploit the existing district, national, regional, and international opportunities to empower political and socio-economic categories of women;
• Define clear institutional roles and responsibilities, coordination and reporting mechanisms in the empowerment of professional and socio-economic categories of women.

V. Scope of Work
The scope of work for the Consultant will include but is not limited to:
• Review the existing documentation. At the national level, a list is long. However, these are key:
• NST1, Vision 2050, NGP, Decentralization Strategy, Economic Recovery Plan (Covid-19)
• Sector Gender Mainstreaming Strategies, WEMTEC Strategy,
• Generation Equality Forum Commitment
• Health, education, ICT Strategies, and good initiatives and practices,

Globally, the review should be consulted but not limited to the following:
• SDGs, CEDAW, Beijing plate from for Action, 1325 UNSC Resolution
• AU Agenda 2063, EAC Gender Strategy, and others.
• Review the implementation of 2015-2020 strategic plan to inform the new strategy;
• Review stakeholder mapping and analysis. The following stakeholders should be consulted but not limited to the same:
• IF, NYC, NCPD, PSF, FFRP, CSOs, FBOs, National Gender Machinery-NGM, Local Gvt, INGOs, Dev. Partners, Ministries, Women at community, NWC structures, and Women in political parties
• Undertake a situation analysis of the NWC operations to date and the women empowerment in Economic, Social, legal and political perspective; gaps and the opportunities
• Through a consultative process and application of an appropriate tool of analysis, identify focus areas and develop strategic objectives and key result areas of the same;
• Develop a Strategic plan incorporating women empowerment strategy (draft) and its results framework for the plan period;
• Hold stakeholder meeting (s) to validate the strategic plan that incorporates women empowerment strategy
• Finalize Strategic plan incorporating women empowerment strategy and submit to the NWC.
• Elaborate the strategy that will be used as an empowerment tools for women in different categories.

VI. Deliverables
At the end of the assignment, the consultant should be able to provide the following:
1. An Inception report describing the methodology and roadmap with deliverables
2. A five-year strategic plan including results and resources framework (draft)
3. A five- year strategic plan document including empowerment strategy with detailed implementation plan, monitoring and evaluation framework plus indicative budget and action plan
VII. Time span
This assignment is expected to be carried out for a period of 30 days

VIII. Institutional Arrangements
The consultant will report directly to the National Executive Secretary of the National Women Council. The NWC will provide relevant background documents necessary for the assignment including, the laws and regulations, internal policies and strategies, annual reports, and evaluation reports. The NWC shall be responsible for the coordination of the meetings and other activities under the consultancy.

IX. Expertise
1. Academic qualifications
At least a master’s degree in relevant strategic management, strategic leadership, organizational development, and another relevant field in the area of planning, public policy, and development studies.
2. Experience
1. At least ten years of professional experience in strategic planning and management;
2. Prior working experience on gender and women’s empowerment
3. Demonstrated experience in working with government partners and other stakeholders in public sector development programs especially, in the area of capacity development.

4. Skills and Competences
1. Ability to work with minimum supervision;
2. High level of writing and oral communications skills in English and minimum of French;
3. Must be result-oriented, a team player, exhibiting high levels of enthusiasm and integrity
4. Demonstrate excellent interpersonal and professional skills in interacting with government and development partners
5. Skills in facilitation of stakeholder’s engagements/workshops;
6. Evidence of having undertaken similar assignments
7. Experience in research, policy development, management, and programming-related work.

Submission Procedure
Interested consultant/firms are requested to submit their application files (Technical and financial offers) electronically only to the following e-mail address: RWA.Procurement@care.org not later than May 26th , 2022 at 5 pm Rwanda time with the following subject: “ Terms of reference for the development of the National Women Council Five -Year Strategic Plan 2022-2027 and update the women empowerment strategy”.
The application file should contain the following documents:
• A technical proposal, with a clear timeframe and a description of the proposed methodology detailing how the deliverables will be achieved, the team suggested, the credentials for similar assignments.
• Detailed Curriculum Vitae of the proposed team to carry out the assignment with clear roles and functions
• A financial offer detailing the various costs associated with the delivery of the above services, in PDF format and must be a separate document from the technical.
• Evidence of the consultant’s experience in the similar assignment: Copies of similar assignments (with evidence for good completion of the previous similar assignments);
• Submit at least 3 references with their contacts and addresses
• Consultant firm profile; VAT registration certificate; RRA tax clearance certificate; RSSB tax clearance certificate (when applicable)
Kigali, May 16th,2022
Procurement Unit
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