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GED Unit Work Plan



Recent Achievements

In September 1994, as part of a Bank-wide reorganization, a Women in Development (WID) unit was established within a newly created central Social Programs and Sustainable Development Department (SDS/WID). This measure effectively promoted the office of a Senior Advisor on WID, who had attended the Bank's WID technical needs since 1987. To respond to the needs of operations, the unit formed three teams (of one staff member and one consultant each) to collaborate with the three regional departments. This approach enabled the unit to maintain a dialogue with the regions, set priorities and offer direct technical support and project review.

Since then, the unit has responded to a variety of requests from project teams for technical support on gender issues in projects. WID has also contributed to the development of several innovative projects which expand the scope of the Bank's investments operations, such as the Nicaragua early childhood development project; the Colombia women heads of household training project; three regional projects on domestic violence; and the women's representation and leadership project. This latter initiative was designed as a response to the Platform of Action of the Fourth UN Women's Conference which underlines the importance of giving women full citizenship rights.

In the policy and strategy areas the WID unit has developed several resource books to increase understanding of gender issues in the region and in the Bank's project design. It has worked closely with operational regional departments in the preparation of country papers for programming activities. The External Advisory Council on Women in Development was established in 1995. The Council opens a dialogue between the Bank and NGOs that work on women's issues; provides technical advice from experts in the field; and helps to make the Bank's activities in WID more responsive to the specific needs, priorities and objectives of the member countries. In 1996 the unit, with matching funds from region 2, placed a WID expert in this regional department to further strengthen the collaboration between WID and the regions.

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Challenges and Opportunities

There has been considerable progress in addressing WID issues in Bank operations since the WID policy was formulated in 1987, a WID action plan was defined in 1991, and the WID unit was established in 1994. Despite this progress, major challenges remain. They involve the question of "mainstreaming" gender issues in Bank lending. Between 1991 and 1995, on average, only about 11% of Bank projects incorporated gender issues in their design. A Bank evaluation of the WID policy and its implementation identifies three constraints for integrating WID in the project cycle: lack of sufficient resources for including WID technical expertise in project preparation; lack of practical guides and tools for gender analysis; and lack of incentives and accountability for middle managers and project teams 1.

The resources constraint was emphasized in a recent WID staff retreat. Resources are needed to provide WID related technical review and support to projects; analyze and document best practices; and provide technical input into strategy formulation and programming efforts. Another constraint is attitudinal. While there has been advancement, there is still a need to legitimize a focus on gender issues in operations and reduce perceived costs of doing WID.

The unit is working to formulate useful guides for gender analysis. While the absence of incentives remains, the lack of accountability has to a large extent been addressed by the expansion this year of an environmental impact screening committee to include gender as well as social impacts. Two review groups have been constituted to screen all projects in the Bank pipeline: a technical review group (TRG) for standard operations and a committee on environmental and social impacts (CESI) for more complex or innovative project designs. WID is represented formally in both review groups. The expansion of this screening committee creates a unique opportunity to strengthen the reach and influence of the WID unit in Bank operations, especially because it occurs in tandem with strong support for WID from the President and Vice President; the mandate of the eighth replenishment that drive attention to gender and poverty concerns; growing staff interest in addressing gender issues in operations; and the establishment of the WID External Advisory Council. The WID work program for 1997-99 has been conceived to take advantage of this special moment in the institutional history of SDS/WID. The program addresses the demands placed by the screening committee as well as the need for resources, practical tools and incentives.


Program Objectives

The main objectives of the SDS/WID program are to:

a) progressively mainstream gender issues into Bank operations by increasing policy and best practices knowledge, and providing technical advice and support to programming efforts and projects; and

b) identify new opportunities for Bank action that will expand the reach of Bank lending and improve women's well-being.

These objectives fit within the framework of the eighth replenishment mandate to reduce poverty and promote social equity and the WID policy mandate to improve women's welfare and enhance their contribution to Bank projects.


Program Strategy

To build expertise, insure quality and maximize impact with limited resources, the SDS/WID work program identifies priority themes and is guided by the following criteria:

· Sharpen and strengthen the focus on the poor, and use this focus as a main criterion for selecting areas of concentration and project priorities;

· Give preference to operations in: education; health; civil society, democracy and governance and legal reform; agriculture and rural development; housing and urban development; income and productivity enhancement (including vocational training, labor markets and microenterprise); social investment funds; and projects involving resettlement.

· Concentrate efforts on few "flagship" issues that provide direction to the unit's work and enhance impact;

· Increase the production and dissemination of WID policy relevant knowledge and best practices.

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Program Components

A. Mainstreaming

Gender issues need to be integrated into Bank research, strategies and policies; country programming exercises; and the project cycle (project design, implementation and evaluation). The unit's emphasis is on quality rather than quantity of Bank products that integrate gender concerns; on projects as the basis for providing information for programming and strategies; and on focusing WID action on the priority sectors and themes mentioned in the program strategy.

Vehicles that the unit is using to promote mainstreaming include: (1) the gender review process in the TRG and CESI screening committees, including some capacity to monitor implementation of the recommendations made; (2) technical assistance to project teams as a result of or in preparation for TRG and CESI reviews; (3) in-country training on gender issues -- on the basis of a training curriculum that the unit is field testing and improving; (4) seminar series in headquarters; and (5) policy relevant and best practices papers.

Best-practices titles under consideration include:

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B. "Flagship" Themes

The unit has identified five priority themes that seem especially promising in terms of opening avenues for Bank action that meet the objectives of both the 8th replenishment and improving women's well-being. They are addressing gender issues in poverty, domestic violence, reproductive health, leadership, and governance and legal reforms.

Poverty. The interaction of gender and poverty issues, including actions that address women's poverty, is an overriding theme for the work of the unit and the Bank. Key is to identify efficient policy and project vehicles to increase the productivity and earnings of poor women. The Bank, in collaboration with UNDP and ECLAC, is currently examining the impact of macroeconomic reforms on the poor in 15 countries; this study will be presented at the IDB 1998 annual meetings. The WID unit is collaborating in adding a gender dimension to the studies and is preparing in-depth gender analyses for selected countries. Additional proposed activities include promoting and undertaking policy and best practices research, organizing a Bank seminar series on gender and poverty issues, and convening an international seminar on "poverty as a women's issue: evidence, lessons and best practices."

Women's Leadership. Women in LAC have attained high levels of schooling and are an increasing presence in the work force. But they remain an untapped resource for leadership. At the Beijing Women's Conference (1995), the Bank made a commitment to help address this leadership gap. The IDB women's leadership and representation project ($3.85 million) will be launched this year. The unit will supervise the execution of the project, which will channel initiatives in the area of women's leadership (including leadership in the entrepreneurial sector) and civic participation. The project will provide rich experience and "best practices" to further women's leadership in the region.

Domestic Violence. The Bank can contribute significantly to raising awareness of the social and economic costs of domestic violence and of the links between domestic violence and general violence as well as in financing anti-violence programs, including preventive operations. The Bank has recently approved a regional technical cooperation (TC) led by the WID unit ($2.875 million) that calls for pilot interventions to address domestic violence in six countries: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Paraguay, Dominican Republic and Venezuela. A second regional TC on judiciary education ($650 thousand) will train judges, police and others on domestic violence in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Ecuador and Uruguay. A video on domestic violence, produced for the Bank, will be aired on television stations throughout the region. Building on these efforts, the unit organized a panel on the links between domestic violence and general violence in a Bank co-sponsored conference on urban violence held in Brazil this March. SDS/WID will convene a two-part conference on domestic violence in the Americas this October in Washington, D.C. that will promote a hemispheric dialogue on a shared problem; explore estimates of incidence and prevalence; estimate economic and social costs of domestic violence in LAC; and analyze best practices and policy options. In response to the interest of governments in Central America, the unit is developing a project that will set up and test pilot interventions in a variety of sectors to address domestic violence for C and D group countries in the region.

Reproductive Health. The ICPD Cairo Conference and LAC's regional plan of action on population and development (1994) underlined the significance of including gender issues in population and development. The challenge now is to implement the reproductive health agenda agreed to in Cairo by the governments of the region. The Bank is well positioned to take up this challenge. President Iglesias' speech at Cairo opened the doors for addressing reproductive health issues; Vice President Birdsall is a recognized authority in the theme of population and development; Honorable Ms. Miller, the Chair of the external WID Advisory Committee, is a well-known international advocate for reproductive health. The Bank has already taken steps to address reproductive health. SDS' social division did initial work in this area; the WID unit carried a preliminary assessment of the level of integration of women's health issues in Bank projects; and region 2 has developed a social strategy that includes reproductive health, in response to the region's demands. Proposed activities include: organizing seminars on the state of the art and best practices to inform a strategy paper; developing a strategy paper on reproductive health, in collaboration with SDS/social and the regions; and following up the strategy with promotion of policy dialogues and pilot projects that address women's reproductive health needs. A focus on reproductive health highlights the (often missed) opportunities of investing in adolescence. Reproductive health and complementary investments to meet the needs of and open avenues for adolescent girls will be emphasized in the proposed activities.

Governance and Legal Reform. Following the 8th replenishment, the Bank is incorporating new areas of relevance into its lending program. This is the case of legal reform and governability programs which offer many opportunities to improve women's condition. The topic is complex and broad and offers different points of entry. Some of the issues involved are women's rights as citizens, labor rights, human rights and the issue of domestic violence, property rights, children's rights, status of women in the marriage, and the responsiveness of the judiciary system of women's issues. The question of governability includes the organization of political parties, political representation, lobbying mechanisms and the mobilizing capacity of women as part of the electorate. Proposed activities include: organizing a roundtable on women's issues in legal reform to review practices and opportunities in the region; producing a best practices paper reviewing the experience of governance, reform of the judiciary system and related operations in expanding choices for women; and participating in selected Bank operations in this area to both provide technical inputs and document best practices approaches.

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Organizational Changes

To meet the objectives of the work program, the unit has adopted a sectoral focus, will decentralize operations and plans to build tangible incentives to promote "mainstreaming" WID issues into Bank practices.

Sectoral Focus. In response to the demands generated by the screening committees, as well as the need to focus and improve the quality of WID services, the current professional staff (three direct hire staff, two senior consultants and the unit chief) has reorganized its technical support along sectoral rather than regional lines. The sectors and themes chosen are mentioned in the program strategy. The same sectors and themes have been identified as priority areas for screening Bank projects and Bank staff have been informed of these priority areas. Staff sectoral responsibilities include TRG and CESI project reviews; direct participation in one or two project teams per year that offer potentially high payoffs in terms of incorporating gender concerns; and drafting "best practices" sectoral papers based in part on information gathered from participation in project teams. Current staff expertise does not cover all the priority themes chosen. Added expertise is required in health, agriculture and rural development and resettlement.

Decentralization. The potential disadvantages of a sectoral versus a regional focus are loss of regular interaction or communication with the regional departments and inability to organize all Bank activities relevant to WID by sector (such as country programming activities). The unit will continue to place priority to integrating gender issues into programming and policy dialogue efforts that the Bank conducts with its member countries. To maximize efficiency, this activity will follow regional rather than sectoral organizational lines.

In addition, to further extend the reach of WID influence in the Bank and increase direct participation of WID technical expertise in project appraisal teams, the unit plans to place WID consultants in the regional departments. There is already one WID consultant in the social division in region 2, paid with matching WID and regional funds. This experience is proving very successful. SDS/WID plans to place one consultant in region 1, one in region 3 and a second one in region 2. SDS/WID would fully cover the consultant costs for the first two years, after which consultants would rotate back to SDS/WID, bringing experience from the region into the central WID unit. The Manager of region 1 has offered to make available to the WID consultant in his region a fund to cover the costs of additional actions needed to mainstream WID into the region's projects.

Building Incentives. The newly established TRG and CESI committees build institutional accountability to the WID policy but only indirectly reward good performance on WID. The unit has, therefore, proposed to senior management the establishment of a yearly WID award for IDB project teams and national counterparts that best integrate gender issues into project design. The award will reinforce the importance that senior management assigns to the issue and will provide a best practices example as well.



April, 1997


1. The Women in Development Policy in the Inter-American Development Bank: An Evolving Perspective in Policy Relevance and Implementation", EVO, October 1996, p.10-11.



Last updated: 02/23/07

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