UNOPS Gender and Diversity Advisor Jobs in Kenya

UNOPS Gender and Diversity Advisor Jobs in Kenya

UNOPS is committed to the mainstreaming of gender equality and women’s empowerment across its portfolio. For example, it is actively involved in the United Nations System-Wide Action Plan (UN-SWAP) for gender equality and women's empowerment, which assigns common performance standards for the gender-related work of all UN entities.

UNOPS has appointed gender focal points at country and partnership offices to facilitate gender activities at the project and office levels and raise awareness on gender-related issues.

One of the key gender goals in UNOPS’ Strategic Plan is to integrate gender considerations in projects to better the lives of both men and women in the countries where it operates, and to work towards gender parity in its own offices.

At the project level, UNOPS has developed a gender toolkit to help project managers, developers and teams incorporate gender into all aspects of project activities.

It provides concrete guidance on how to better take into account the needs of women, men, girls and boys while implementing projects.

However, it has been widely noticed that successful gender equality work has to tackle gender roles and powers in society.

It has to be transformative and mainstreamed in all project activities, rather than being added as an afterthought.

As such, gender equality action has to be deeply embedded in a country’s socio-political, cultural and economic context. Gender equality measures and strategies have to be part and parcel of all joined United Nations development frameworks in a given country, as well as in all UNOPS strategic and programmatic approaches.

In particular, strong enhancement of the gender dimensions in the justice, security and resilience actions under the resource facilities, which UNOPS currently establishes on behalf of the European Union and DFID in Somalia and elsewhere in the region, will be important.

Experience in the last decade has shown that women have to be active key partners in justice and security sector reforms – rather than only recipients of aid and services.

They need to contribute to the shaping of justice and security in order to make those services respond to their needs.

Furthermore, women have proven to play an important role in resilience strategies in emergencies, as they are the main caretakers of families and often develop innovative coping mechanisms in crises. Considering gender issues as a key cornerstone in the new resource facilities will be crucial for their effectiveness and for solid results.

In addition, project design requires due consideration of social and other safeguards issues. This includes identification of issues and development of effective safeguards management strategies and operational measures in alignment with international donor standards and international best practice.

In view of successfully working towards gender equality and women’s empowerment and effective safeguards management in the East and South Africa region, the incumbent will;

Functional Responsibilities