Through its national development planning including the National Development Plan 8 (2017-2020) and Nation Development Plan -9 (2020-2025), the Government of Somalia recognizes the importance of mainstreaming gender and human rights, underpinning the importance of a holistic approach towards achieving sustainable peace and development. Gender inequality negatively informs poverty, resilience, economic and social development as well as peace. The continuous neglect of the root-causes of gender inequality, the lack of empowerment and human rights will continue to curtail the sustainable development and peace-building agenda of Somalia. Changes made so far have focused on the protection of women but have done little to engage women as part of the solution, as agents to develop legislation, policies, strategies, structures, services, with associated budget allocations required to secure an environment where women have equal opportunities and access to fulfil their potential and contribute equally to peace and sustainable development. . Part of the challenge results from women and girls who remain uninformed about their potential to make real contributions to the well-being of their communities, families, children and themselves as well as to overall national peace and development. There is a need to strengthen positive awareness amongst women, girls as well as marginalized communities and to capture these stories and examples of women’s contributions to national development and peace. Equally, men and boys need to recognize the important role women already play in sustaining lives and how this can be further strengthened in a complementary manner. In 2020, the Ministry of Women and Human Rights Development (MOWHRD), in partnership with the Ministry of Planning and Inclusive Economic Development (MOPIED) conducted a national women consultation that reached out to over 10220 women across Somalia. The findings are being feed back into the NDP process and shared through existing women platforms and media channels for a concerted advocacy campaign to ensure compliance to the principles of the Somalia Women’s Charter. The UNDP SDG Implementation Facility for Fragile and Conflict Affected Situations builds on this work by supporting gender mainstreaming with evidence gained through the survey, research on official development assistance allocations to gender equality interventions and training to gender focal points and tr local media to understand the SDG framework. Against this backdrop UNDP is seeking to engage an international consultant to mentor a group of Somali journalists to conduct research and interviews with key government officials, civil society, implementing partners and beneficiaries and produce an analysis of progress on

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