Gender and Development

Bangladesh: Gender Mainstreaming in Disaster Damage Rehabilitation

Background & Rationale

In response to the two major floods and one cyclone in 2007, ADB designed the Bangladesh: Emergency Disaster Damage Rehabilitation Sector Project for immediate support for food, medicine and shelter as well as rehabilitation of damaged roads, rural infrastructure, municipal infrastructure and water management infrastructure. The subproject will address gender based needs in restoration of livelihoods and economic activities during disaster rehabilitation in the implementation of the emergency loan.

Expected Outcome

The subproject will seek to provide support to Executing Agencies (EAs) in the areas of gender mainstreaming of the emergency loan. The outcome of the subproject will be (a) effective restoration of women's participation in economic and social activities in disaster-affected areas; and (b) improved income and self-reliance. Its components will include technical support and capacity building to EAs and contractors.

The outputs of this sub-project will be (a) increased access for women of disaster affected families to employment opportunities; and (b) improved capacity of EAs to address gender based needs in disaster rehabilitation. The sub-project will also help EAs in monitoring gender related impacts through specific sets of quantitative and qualitative gender indicators. The success indicators will be sizeable share of women in the livelihood restoration activities in infrastructure construction and maintenance, reduction of wage gap between women and men; and enhanced knowledge and skills of EAs in motivating contractors to apply gender and social aspects including labor standards.

Results to Date

Through the provision of technical support and capacity building, the subproject helped the executing and implementing agencies follow the gender action plans, adhered to the core labor standard, and complied with project assurances. The subproject also supported executing agencies to monitor performance in the area of gender mainstreaming in labor standards and supported them in identifying gender-based indicators for monitoring of sex-disaggregated employment of laborers and disbursement of wages. The subproject also helped developed ownership among executing agencies by partnering with them in the conduct of all the training and orientation activities. Participants included project staff, executive engineers, sub-divisional engineers, construction contractors, sectional officers, work assistants and labor leaders. Though the subproject has been completed, additional training and orientation on gender has been planned for the Roads and Highways Department. The identified and integrated gender-based indicators in the MIS system will help in sustaining the results.

Related Documents

• Final Report
• Case Study