Background:

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works 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. While Albania has made significant progress in promoting gender equality, women continue to face barriers in fully enjoying their human rights, being less likely to participate in the formal labour market and negatively affected by persisting gender stereotypes and harmful social norms which contribute to their persistent marginalization, especially in rural areas. Women play an important role in agriculture and rural development in Albania, making up 40% of the agriculture workforce (INSTAT, 2022), although in most cases invisible and informal. Male gender roles in agriculture are predominantly associated with tasks that involve control over agricultural assets and implements, mobility, decision-making and access to market, whereas female gender roles are associated with manual work, including pre-harvest and post-harvest activities, food processing, quality control, and household tasks. Furthermore, women’s access to technical and financial resources and information through agricultural extension service remains very limited, and women represent only 10 % of all beneficiaries of extension services (FAO, 2016). Women are rarely members of, or represented in, formal associations or committees. Their limited access to transportation in rural areas has direct implications for their access to health and social services, education, employment and participation in decision making, making them dependent on male relatives and putting them further at risk of marginalization. This is especially alarming with the persistence of patriarchal attitudes in rural areas, which often results in GBV. UN Women in Albania has supported the Government and relevant institution to address these challenges in the past, including through targeted interventions promoting women’s economic empowerment in rural areas. Women are also strongly discriminated compared to men in term of access to property, while existing legislation guarantees women’s property rights and co-ownership, the implementation of the legislation has been too often hindered by discriminatory cultural and social attitudes, practices at the institutional and community levels, and women’s lack of knowledge of their rights. This has affected women’s inheritance rights as well as entitlements.

To address these challenges, UN Women with the support of the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation and funding from the Directorate General for Development Cooperation of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation is implementing the project “Empower Women for Rural Development in Northern Albania”, aiming to improve the empowerment of women in Northern Albania and promote their role as active contributors to sustainable rural development.

Overall, the project will contribute to the realization of SDG targets 2.3, 5.a, 8.3. The intervention is aligned with the EU Gender Action Plan III, The National Strategy for Gender Equality (NSGE) 2021-2030, the National Strategy for Agriculture, Rural Development and Fisheries, and responds to the CEDAW Concluding Observations for Albania (2023). The CEDAW Committee highlights that rural women in Albania continue to face challenges in terms of accessing justice, receive adequate information and support services in cases of violence, accessing health and education, suffering from gender stereotypes and harmful practices such as child marriage and honor killings, limited access to the labor market and limited participation in decision-making processes. The EU report (2024) also highlights that women living in rural and remote areas face limited access to primary healthcare and to sexual and reproductive healthcare services.

Additionally, this intervention contributes to UN Women Albania Strategic Note (SN) 2022-2026 which aims to ensure that “All Women and girls enjoy and exercise their human rights in a gender equal society and meaningfully contribute to Albania’s sustainable and inclusive socio-economic development and EU integration”, and the UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework of Albania 2022-2026, specifically outcomes 4 on Gender Responsive Governance and outcome 2 on Sustainable, resilient and green economic growth and resource management.

As the project has initiated its second year of intervention, UN Women is seeking a national consultant to conduct the Mid-Term review (MTR) of the intervention, with a view of informing the remaining implementation period based on progress and results so far and the intended Outcome. The MTR will assess the progress towards the achievement of results as specified in the Results Framework of the programme and overall project implementation plan and timeline. The review will assess early signs of success or failure with the goal of identifying the necessary modifications to be made to set the programme on-track to achieve its intended results. The MTR will review the strategy and risks to sustainability as well as identify lessons learned which could be further explored and replicated in the upcoming project.

The consultant will be reporting to the Project Management Specialist, and work in collaboration with the Technical Project Analyst, the RBM and Coordination Analyst and the Head of Programme, and will be supported by the Programme Assistant who will be the point of contact on the contract and payment issues.

Description of Responsibilities/ Scope of Work

1. Review Project design/implementation 

• Review the continued relevance and coherence of the project in light of the current context (including policy, institutional, and socio-economic developments), including an assessment of the logical coherence of the Theory of Change.
• Review actual project implementation against the approved project document and workplan and recommend potential improvements to the implementation strategy using gender-responsive lenses. 

2. Review Progress Towards Results, Outcomes/Outputs focusing on:

• The indicators from programme’s results framework assessed against the progress made towards the set targets.
• Identification of key barriers to achieving the programme results within the remaining implementation timeframe.
• Identification and documentation of aspects of the programme that have already been successful, including promising practices and upscaling opportunities. Highlight good practices, innovative approaches and lessons learned.
• Assess whether the project is on track to achieve its outcomes by project end and identify areas requiring corrective action or acceleration measures.

3. Review project management, efficiency and communication

• Overall effectiveness of project management arrangements, including responsibilities and reporting lines.
• Whether the project staffing structure facilitates interactions among team members and effective project implementation and learning.
• Internal project communication mechanisms.
• Overall implementation plan and annual workplans and assess any challenges in delivering the project outputs and outcomes within the foreseen timeframe.
• Whether there were any delays in programme start-up and implementation and the main causes identified
• Examine the use of the results framework/log-frame as a management tool. Review if any changes have been made since programme started, or if any changes need to be made in the upcoming period.
• Identify if the programme has the appropriate financial controls, including reporting and planning, that allows the management to make informed decisions regarding the budget expenditure and timely flow of funds.
• The monitoring tools currently being used. 
• Examine the financial management of the budget for monitoring and evaluation. 
• Whether the project’s team fulfil UN Women’s reporting requirements to the donor in a timely manner and in compliance with the applicable quality standards.
• The effectiveness of external project communication with stakeholders. 
• External project communication with the public, including whether appropriate communication channels have been established or are being established to convey the programme progress and intended impact.

4. Assess Sustainability

• Assess the likelihood that project results will be sustained beyond the project lifecycle, including institutional, financial, technical and social sustainability dimensions.
• Validate whether risks identified in the Risk Matrix remain relevant and adequate. Recommend necessary modifications, including emerging risks.
• Assess mitigation measures implemented and their effectiveness.
• Analyse the likelihood that sufficient financial and institutional resources will be available after project completion. Identify potential funding or resource mobilization opportunities from multiple sources to sustain project outcomes.
• Assess the likelihood that project results will be sustained beyond the project lifecycle, including institutional, financial, technical and social sustainability dimensions.
• Validate whether risks identified in the Risk Matrix remain relevant and adequate. Recommend necessary modifications, including emerging risks.
• Assess mitigation measures implemented and their effectiveness.
• Analyse the likelihood that sufficient financial and institutional resources will be available after project completion. Identify potential funding or resource mobilization opportunities from multiple sources to sustain project outcomes.

5. Provide conclusions and recommendations

The MTR consultant will include a dedicated section of the report setting out clear and evidence-based conclusions aligned with the areas of review. Conclusions should be concise and limited to key strategic findings.

Recommendations should:

• Be actionable and prioritized;
• Be specific, measurable, achievable and relevant within the remaining implementation period;
• Clearly indicate responsible actors and suggested timelines for implementation.

A recommendation matrix/table shall be included in the Executive Summary, summarizing each recommendation, its priority level and proposed responsible party.

Deliverables

• Inception report with proposed MTR methodology, including proposed data collection tools, work plan and structure of the MTR report;
• A draft preliminary MTR report and one (1) presentation, to be delivered at a debriefing meeting with UN Women and partners;
• A final report that should include the following in its structure:
• Executive Summary
• Outcomes from the different consultations conducted with project stakeholders
• Introduction (including context, scope, methodology and limitations)
• Key Findings and Conclusions
• Recommendations (modifications/adjustments needed for on-going or future work
• Summary on challenges, lessons learned and promising practices
• Annexes (list of stakeholders/interviewees consulted, list of documents reviewed, etc.).
• Clean data sets to be used as annexes.

All deliverables should be prepared and submitted in English language unless otherwise requested by UN Women. 

Mid-term Review Approach and Methodology

The MTR must provide evidence-based information that is credible, reliable and useful. The MTR consultant will review all relevant sources of information (listed below) and any other materials considered useful for this review. The MTR consultant is expected to also propose interviews, focus group discussions and other data collection methodologies discussed and agreed with UN Women. The MTR is expected to follow a collaborative and participatory approach ensuring close engagement with the UN Women project team, AICS, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, and other key stakeholders as relevant.

The MTR consultant should as a minimum review the following documents:

• Signed agreement of the project entitled “Empower women for rural development in Northern Albania”, including its annexes 
• Narrative Annual Report for 2025 including the Progress of Indicators matrix
• Annual Work Plans for 2025 and 2026
• UN Women Strategic Note 2022-2026 including Theory of Change for relevant priority areas
• Communications material (such as project website, published project related stories on UN Women social media, etc.)
• Programme deliverables (such as training materials, studies, policy briefs)
• All monitoring reports prepared by the project (such as monitoring oversight mission reports, meeting minutes, conclusions of the steering committee).
• Steering Committee meeting minutes and related documentation. 

Consultant’s Workplace and Official Travel

This is a home-based consultancy. 

As part of this assignment, there will be up to two trips to the target project municipalities.

Competencies :

Core Values:

• Integrity;
• Professionalism;
• Respect for Diversity.

Core Competencies:

• Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues;
• Accountability;
• Creative Problem Solving;
• Effective Communication;
• Inclusive Collaboration;
• Stakeholder Engagement;
• Leading by Example.

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

Functional Competencies:

• Strong skills in developing, designing and preparing well-structured, logically organized guidance materials, overviews, briefs, and similar knowledge products.
• Strong analytical skills and ability to synthesize straightforward and clear content from a range of complex background documents.
• Ability to produce knowledge and information materials tailored to the specific target-audience and fine-tuned to the purpose and country context.
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills (both oral and written).
• Strong organizational and time management skills.
• Demonstrated ability to interact effectively with team members.
• Strong initiative-taker.
• Focuses on impact and results.
• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive, problem-solving attitude.

Required Qualifications

Education and Certification:

• Masters’ degree or equivalent in social sciences, human rights, gender/women's studies, international development, or a related field is required.
• A first-level university degree in combination with two additional years of qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience:

• At least 10 years of experience in implementation, monitoring and evaluation of projects/programmes and use of results-based programme management methodologies
• Experience in monitoring and evaluating gender programming 
• Experience in conducting research, assessments and reviews on gender equality and women’s empowerment issues would be an asset
• Experience in similar assignments with UN agencies or international development organisations would be desirable. 

Languages:

Fluency in English and Albanian is required.

Statements :

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women's empowerment.

Diversity and inclusion:

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.)

Note: Applicants must ensure that all sections of the application form, including the sections on education and employment history, are completed. If all sections are not completed the application may be disqualified from the recruitment and selection process.