Extended Call for Proposals (for selected countries): Consultant to Assess Gender Barriers for Transgender Women in Receiving HIV Services

We are looking for national informants for a study assessing gender barriers for transgender women in receiving HIV services 

TERMS OF REFERENCE FOR NATIONAL INFORMANTS: Collection of country data on the existing checklist regarding gender barriers in accessing HIV services for transgender women. Data collection will be carried out in one or more of the 15 countries.

ECOM, the Eurasian Coalition on Health, Rights, Gender and Sexual Diversity, is an international non-governmental association that fights to create an enabling environment in Eastern Europe and Central Asia so that gay men, other men who have sex with men, and trans* people have access to sexual and reproductive health services, including prevention and treatment of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), based on scientific evidence and respect for human rights.

One of ECOM's tools for achieving the goal of creating an enabling legal environment is to collect strategic information in relation to gender issues, and to use the data for further advocacy and to improve existing services.

Transgender people belong to one of the five key populations particularly vulnerable to HIV recognized by UNAIDS. HIV prevalence among transgender women can be up to 49 times higher than among the general population. Factors that may increase the risk of HIV infection include unprotected sex, depression and anxiety, the use of various psychoactive substances during sex, and involvement in sex work.

Different statuses and identities can lead to even greater insecurity and worse access to medical, legal, social and other services. For example, transgender women migrants who are involved in sex work and use drugs may encounter transphobia, misogyny and sexism, xenophobia, narcophobia and bias against sex workers, as well as racism and classism.

ECOM, together with the Eurasian Women's AIDS Network, is preparing to conduct an assessment to identify gender barriers in accessing HIV services in 15 project countries. The Eurasian Women's AIDS Network is conducting research among women living with HIV (PLH), people who use drugs (PUD) and sex workers (SW). ECOM is conducting research among transgender women. We expect that the identification, measurement, and analysis of the gender barriers faced by girls and women from different communities in the countries of the EECA region will help to increase common understanding of:

Priority community and geographic coverage for this call:

The Eurasian Women's AIDS Network has created a checklist based on UNAIDS’ GAT for women from communities of PLH, PUD, and SW in order to conduct a community-based assessment of gender barriers to accessing HIV services. ECOM, together with a hired consultant who authored this study, is adapting this checklist for transgender women. 

The checklist includes questions on behavioral data; social, cultural and economic factors; legal and political factors; the needs of women in HIV policy and programming; and a comprehensive HIV response. 

This call was created to recruit national informants, who will then collect data on a country based on an adapted checklist. Data can be collected for one country or several depending on the expertise of the informant. Data is collected on the basis of publicly available information in the country, including legislation and normative documents, studies or analytical articles.

The lead consultant and author of the study will prepare instructions on data collection for national informants and will conduct a training overview of the checklist with ECOM’s research manager. Supervision and consultations will be carried out during data collection.

Countries for which data collection by national informants is needed:

The working languages of the study are Russian and English: the training, checklist, accompanying information, and supervising consultations will be presented in one of the two languages. However, the collected data in the form of links to relevant documents can be in any national languages.

Goal: Collect data to complete the existing checklist to further identify gender barriers for transgender women in accessing HIV services in 15 countries in the region.

Completed checklist.

Transgender women applying for this position will be prioritized. 

CV submitted by the consultant, showing how they meet the qualification requirements described above.  

The amount of remuneration is 1000 US dollars for the entire terms of reference for data collection for one country.

A contract for the provision of services will be signed between the national informant and ECOM, according to which ECOM will not be responsible for the payment of any taxes by the consultant; all taxes and other payments required by the law of the country of residence are handled by the consultant themselves.

We invite you to submit your proposals to the email address: tenders@ecom.ngo with the subject line “Assessment of gender barriers”.

Deadline for submitting applications is 23.55 Tallinn time on October 13.

If you have additional questions or need any clarifications, please contact ECOM’s Advocacy Coordinator Daniyar Orsekov at daniyar@ecom.ngo.