Strengthening Gender Data Systems in Crisis and Humanitarian Settings Transformative Outcomes

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. 

UN Women is implementing the initiative Transformative Outcomes: Leveraging Gender Data in Conflict and Crisis Settings, funded through the Complex Risk and Analytics Fund (CRAF’d). The project aims to strengthen the availability, quality, ethical use and influence of gender data in conflict, disaster and complex risk contexts, enabling more effective and gender-responsive humanitarian and crisis-related decision-making.

 

Women, girls and gender-diverse people often remain invisible within humanitarian data systems, despite facing distinct risks, barriers to assistance, shifts in gender roles, and heightened protection concerns. The CRAF’d project seeks to close these data gaps by improving indicators, methodologies, information management (IM) systems, partnerships and data flows within UN Women and across the wider humanitarian ecosystem.

 

As part of the CRAF’d workplan:

• UN Women has drafted a core global set of indicators to track gender in humanitarian action. These now require technical refinement, validation with UN agencies and clusters, and alignment with feasible secondary data sources.
• UN Women Country Offices (COs) require strengthened qualitative approaches to capture shifts in gender relations, agency, access/control of resources, decision-making and barriers to assistance—areas often missed in standard humanitarian assessments.
• There is a need for a coherent strategy and plan to strengthen information management, data collection, analysis, visualisation and use across UN Women COs, ensuring alignment with humanitarian standards and integration into HPC processes.
• The project also requires Data Sharing Agreements (DSAs) with key UN agencies and humanitarian partners to support responsible global and country-level data exchange, including integration into the Women Count platform.

Description of Responsibilities/ Scope of Work

Under the supervision of the Research and Knowledge Management Humanitarian Specialist, the consultant will support UN Women to strengthen its systems, tools and partnerships for gender data generation, analysis and use in crisis settings by:

1. Finalizing a draft set of core global indicators on gender in humanitarian action.
2. Developing a light, practical methodology and system for collecting and analysing qualitative gender data.

Drafting Data Sharing Agreements (DSAs) to facilitate global and country-level data flow and integration into Women Count.

Deliverables

Objective 1: Finalise the Global Indicator Set

• Review and refine UN Women’s draft indicators for gender in humanitarian action.
• Ensure alignment with:
  • IASC Gender Handbook
  • GiHA commitments
  • Sectoral guidance (GBV, WASH, CASH, Protection)
  • UN Women Humanitarian Strategy 2022–2025
• Map feasible secondary data sources (HNO/HRP, OCHA/UNHCR datasets, protection monitoring, GBVIMS, cluster 5Ws, CASH WG, WASH assessments).
• Support virtual inter-agency consultations and validation workshops with relevant UN agencies and clusters to finalise the indicators.
• Produce final indicator list, metadata sheets, disaggregation guidance and reporting pathways.

Objective 2: Develop Methodology for Qualitative Gender Indicators and Support Piloting and Light Testing of Tools in country contexts

• Identify 3–5 qualitative indicators aligned to:
  • Changes in gender roles
  • Decision-making power
  • Agency and control over resources
  • Barriers to accessing assistance
  • Intersectional factors (age, disability, SOGIESC, displacement status)
• Develop qualitative data-collection tools:
  • FGD guides for diverse groups
  • Key Informant Interview (KII) tools
  • Remote/rapid data-collection options
  • Ethical and safe data-protection protocols (PSEA, GBV, disability inclusion)
• Design:
  • A light data system (Excel/Kobo-compatible templates)
  • Analysis framework and coding structure
  • Guidance for CO-level use, visualization and reporting
• Pilot the use of these tools: 
  • Conduct light testing of tools in 6 CRAFd countries
  • Update the tools and guidance accordingly for final roll out

Objective 3: Draft Technical Components of Data Sharing Agreemen