TERMS OF REFERENCE
- Background
Under Sustainable Development Goal 5 Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls, SDG Target 5.6 aims to “ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights as agreed in accordance with the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development and the Beijing Platform for Action and the outcome documents of their review conferences”. UNFPA, as the custodian agency for SDG Indicators 5.6.1 and 5.6.2, is responsible for the measurement and reporting of both indicators.
SDG 5.6.1, Proportion of women aged 15–49 years who make their own informed decisions regarding sexual relations, contraceptive use and reproductive health care, was updated to Tier 2 in September 2016. It is derived from the following three component questions:
- Whether a woman can say no to her husband/partner if she does not want to have sexual intercourse;
- Whether using or not using contraception is mainly the woman’s decision or a joint decision with husband/partner;
- Whether a woman can make own decision about reproductive health care for herself.
Currently data for SDG Indicator 5.6.1 is derived from Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), which include direct questions for the first two components, and a proxy question for the third component. Data coverage for these three component questions varies widely between countries. In the recent 2018 SDG reporting, UNFPA reported data for 47 countries with a total of 67 data points. Of the 47 countries, 18 countries have at least 2 data points.
- Rationale and Objectives of the Consultancy
The overall aim of the consultancy is to support further research of SDG indicator 5.6.1.
Specifically, the consultancy firm will conduct research on SDG 5.6.1 focusing on the following 4 areas:
- Cross-sectional analysis for various socio-demographic groups. Possible disaggregations include geographic location, residence, highest level of education, wealth index, race and ethnicity, and disability;
- Determinants of women’s decision making on sexual and reproductive health (components of SDG 5.6.1), possibly using multivariate and multilevel analysis;
- Associations between women’s decision making on sexual and reproductive health and actual sexual and reproductive health practices and outcomes;
- Associations between women’s decision making on sexual and reproductive health and other dimensions of gender equality and women’s empowerment such as education, employment, leadership and management positions, and asset ownership.
- Expected Deliverables
The expected deliverable is a thoroughly researched paper on SDG 5.6.1 covering the above 4 mentioned areas, including a review of social science literature on gender equality and women’s empowerment, and interpretation of results.
The paper will be submitted for peer-review journals, and a subset of the analysis will be used to produce a UN glossy report and/or fact sheet.
Co-authorship of the peer-review paper will be offered to the consultancy firm.
- Profile of Consultant
The following are required for this consultancy:
- Excellent writing skills, and synthesizing research/policy reports
- Knowledgeable of social science methods – quantitative and contextual interpretation of results
- Expert in DHS datasets, and other relevant datasets may be used in the study
- Demonstrated experience and expertise in data analysis using SPSS and/or R
- Prior exposure to research in SRH and Gender Equality
- Language Skills: Fluency in English is required. Working knowledge of another official UN language is desirable.
- Organizational information
The consultancy firm will directly report to Emilie Filmer-Wilson, Human Rights Adviser of Gender, Human Rights and Culture Branch. Mengjia Liang and Alfredo Fort, Population and Data Branch are on the technical advisory team of this study.
The consultancy firm will be hired for approximately 30 working days. The consultancy firm is expected to commence by mid/late August 2018.
How to apply
Applications with an updated CV or P11 to be sent with title in the subject line of the email "Consultancy: Analyzing Women’s Decision Making in Sexual and Reproductive Health and Reproductive Rights" and send it to filmer-wilson@unfpa.org. Deadline for this application is 23 July 2018 5:00 PM NYT
We are no longer accepting applications for this position.
