- Details
-
Created: Monday, 10 January 2022 10:52
Second half of 2021 included a short assignment with SOS Børnebyerne in Kenya facilitating a regional program planning workshop in August; a Gender Audit of Financial Sector Deepening Zambia in September - November; and the assessment of applications from 18 Danish NGOs for Strategic Partnerships 2022 - 2025 with Danida from September to December.
The start of 2022 holds a number of assignments through FCG Sweden's framework contracts with Sida and Norad. On these contracts, I am part of FCG's core group of team leaders - and this will materialize in the following contracts in the start of 2022:
- Evaluation of the Sida-funded Strengthening Accountability Program II implemented by Diakonia in Zambia. We are a team of three consultants - the two team members are based in Zambia, and the team leader from Bente Consulting will be working remotely from Denmark. The assignment will run from January to April 2022.
- Reviews of two Norad-funded CSOs in Brazil: IPAM and Imazon. We are a team of three consultants who will all be working remotely from Denmark, Finland and Mozambique. The assignment will run from February to May 2022. These reviews were originally scheduled to start in March 2020 , but have been on corona standby for two years.
- Details
-
Created: Monday, 10 January 2022 10:26
In 2021, Danida renewed its strategic partnerships with Danish NGOs for the period 2022 - 2025. The selection of strategic partners was through an open call, which resulted in 18 applications. The assessment was carried out by a team of external consultants in close collaboration with the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Danida). In addition to the assessment of applications, the assignment also included preparation of assessment tools, training of MFA staff involved in the process and drafting of assessment notes. The contract was held by HN Consultants, and Bente Consulting provided the team leader. The assignment took place from September to December 2021.
- Details
-
Created: Wednesday, 06 October 2021 09:54
Bente Consulting - in collaboration with Bwalya Penza, independent gender consultant - is undertaking an organizational Gender Audit of Financial Sector Deepening Zambia.The work is carried out remotely and involves document review, interviews with all FSD Zambia teams, a staff survey, and interviews with external implementing partners and clients (government institutions, financial institutions and companies). The methodology is based on the EIGE Gender Audit tool, addressing the four areas of political will and leadership; technical capacity;accountability and systems; and organizational culture. In addition to the Gender Audit report, a Gender Mainstreaming Action Plan for the coming 2-3 years will be prepared. Read more about FSD Zambia here. The Gender Audit is carried out in the period of September to November 2021.
- Details
-
Created: Tuesday, 05 October 2021 10:39
In August 2021, Bente Consulting facilitated a week's regional workshop in Kenya for the SOS Children's Villages partners from Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda, Ethiopia, Somaliland and Denmark. Based on their previous work with national youth workshops and national needs assessments / context analyses, we went through problem analysis, stakeholder mapping, results framework and an overall Theory of Change - and produced the building blocks for a program addressing the specific challenges of young people leaving various care arrangements. Like in Denmark, also African young people having been brought up outside their own family, the transition into adulthood after the age of 18 may be tough.
- Details
-
Created: Friday, 02 July 2021 14:59
Holidays count-down…. Finalizing one of the most productive 6-months period in my life as an independent consultant. In collaboration with a lot of great co-consultants, this has since January this year resulted in the following reports:
- Gender Peer Review for Financial Sector Deepening Africa Network (30 pages main report + facilitation of 10 workshops)
- Kosovo Agency for Gender Equality - evaluation of Swedish support (44 pages main report + technical proposal + inception report) - for FCG in collaboration with Ariana Qusaj-Mustafa
- AIDS-fondet review for CISU (24 pages main report + Inception Note) - in collaboration with Camilla von Schroeder
- UN Women Innovation Facility - review of Danish support ( 31 pages report) - in collaboration with Charlotte Kanstrup
- UNFPA Innovation Fund - review of Danish support (32 pages report) - in collaboration with Charlotte Kanstrup
- Evaluation of LO Norway’s collaboration with OTM-CS in Mozambique (36 pages main report + technical proposal + Inception Note) - in collaboration with Elias Ainadine
- Evaluation of Foundation for Civil Society in Tanzania (50 pages main report + technical proposal + Inception Note) - for Niras in collaboration with Stephen Kirama, Adelaide Kisinda and Linda Helgesson Sekei.
In addition, a few other jobs were also completed:
- Women’s Digital Financial Inclusion initiative (WDFI) 2021–2025 - guidance and QA on writing of project proposal for Financial Sector Deepening Mozambique
- Assessment of 19 NGO applications for Danida Strategic Partnerships 2022-2025 - for HN Consultants in collaboration with Christian Boehm and Søren Langhoff
- Human Rights Based Approach in program management - presentation at University of Nairobi webinar - in collaboration with Joshua Nyamori
Time for taking a good long break before I am back by mid-August for new and exciting jobs:
- Facilitation of a one week regional planning workshop for SOS Børnebyerne in Nairobi - with physical presence! August 2021.
- Gender mainstreaming and accountability roadmap for Financial Sector Deepening Zambia in September - October 2021.
Have a nice summer all of you - and a special thank you to all the great colleagues with whom I have worked this first half of 2021!
- Details
-
Created: Monday, 19 April 2021 08:33
Foundation for Civil Society (FCS) in Tanzania is undertaking an endline evaluation of their Strategic Plan 2016 - 2020 with the aim of documenting results and drawing lessons learned for the formulation of the next Strategic Plan. NIRAS Tanzania is providing the team and Bente Consulting the team leader for the evaluation which takes place as a mixture of virtual and physical meetings and interviews. Internal stakeholders (FCS founding members, board and management), their grantees (currently approx. 130 smaller CSOs) and cluster leads (major, national NGOs), development partners (SDC, Sida and Danida), as well as relevant national and local government institutions are interviewed. Surveys with former grantees as well as all current grantees will be undertaken. The focus of the evaluation is on relevance, coherence and coordination, effectiveness and efficiency, as well as impact and sustainability. A special focus is on gender and social inclusion (youth, disability, minorities]. The FCS grants support initiatives in social accountability in different sectors (agriculture, education, health and water), social inclusion and fight against harmful practices, and women's land rights. Capacity building is a pivotal activity in strengthening civil society voice. The evaluation runs from February to June 2021.