Gender and Development

Bangladesh

Secondary Towns Infrastructure Development Project II, 1995

Project Background

Sustainable urban development therefore depends upon the capacity of local authorities to generate sufficient levels of municipal revenue to sustain urban infrastructure investments. This requires understanding the local community's needs and demands, and implementing affordable and equitable cost recovery systems.

Along with considering the divergent needs of slum dwellers and middle class neighborhoods, the project team recognized that women and men differ in their roles, needs and perceptions of urban development and housing, hence differ in their priorities as well.

Project Design

The Secondary Towns Infrastructure Development Project II is a comprehensive urban development project, which aims to provide urban infrastructure that meets basic human needs, reduce poverty and improve the environment. The project supports the government's decentralization policy by strengthening the capacity of local authorities to generate sufficient levels of municipal revenue to sustain urban infrastructure investments. The project comprises the following components:

• The rehabilitation of physical infrastructure, e.g. roads and bridges, drainage, solid waste management, water supply, sanitation, town center development

• Slum upgrading to improve the physical environment and the lives of the urban poor; pilot projects for low-income housing, land use planning and privatization of solid waste management

• Institutional development of

  1. a Urban Municipality (Pourashava) Support Unit to enhance the revenue generation in the municipalities
  2. the National Institute of Local Government
  3. the establishment of regional training centres in four model municipalities (pourashavas) to strengthen the ability of the municipalities to sustain the existing and proposed infrastructure

The project is working in 22 municipalities. About 72 percent of the cost of the project is dedicated to infrastructure improvements (roads and bridges, storm-water drainage, town center developments, solid waste management, sanitation, water supply and slum upgrading). As part of this, 30,000 double pit latrines and 40 public latrines will be constructed with the assistance of NGOs. The collection and disposal of 80 percent of household wastes and 100 percent of other wastes in the project area is another infrastructural target. The remaining funds are set aside for housing and land development, institutional development, financing charges, project implementation and management, design and supervision, and operation and maintenance.

Gender Inclusive Design

Gender has been included in the various stages of the project cycle. During social assessment and project design stages, the position of women in general and in the project was analyzed. Following project implementation review, features were included as mid-course corrections to support the full participation of women as project beneficiaries and decision makers.

Social Assessment

During project design, a survey was conducted and women were consulted on their needs. Poor women were targeted as major beneficiaries of infrastructure development and slum improvement components of the project. Specifically, women would benefit from income generating employment opportunities, improved sanitation and hygiene (and hence improved women and children's health), better access to services, increased access to shelter, easier water collection, and more privacy and convenience for sanitation. Provision was made for separate consultations with women on physical design and facilities such as public toilets and private latrine construction.

Women's Participation in Decision-Making

Apart from women's practical, everyday needs the project design addressed women's involvement as decision-makers and their participation in community-based organizations and NGOs responsible for implementing various development activities. To this end, it was stipulated that:

• Both male and female consultants be employed in public awareness and hygiene education campaigns.

• Community organizers and community health care workers employed in the slum upgrading component be women.

• Women's organizations in each municipality to be consulted by the project implementation unit during the design and construction of urban facilities.

• The project design also noted that several of the ward commissioners within the municipalities were women and the desirability of working with these women to further the priorities and needs of women in the project.

Mid Course Review

During project mid-term review, it became apparent that women's participation in the project was confined to the slum improvement component. While a considerable achievement in itself, the project was not mainstreaming gender in all project activities. As a result, a Special Study on Gender was conducted. The issues uncovered in this study included:

The tendency within infrastructure projects to prioritize construction over 'software' components.

Restricting women's participation to slum improvement components excludes women who do not live in slums.

Urban development is a complex affair and greater understanding of social complexities including gender is important in implementing urban sector projects. Part of the problem is a lack of the necessary skills to analyze a project from a GAD perspective and/or to redesign project components to benefit women.

The involvement of NGOs is not sufficient in itself, unless they are trained to implement gender-inclusive projects.

Gender and participatory aspects are often not given serious attention by consultants.

Including women in a few targeted areas, such as slum development, micro credit etc., can lead to a level of complacency about addressing gender issues and to the failure to address gender in all components of the project.

Mid Course Correction

With the assistance of ADB's Resident Mission GAD Specialist and the Environmental Monitoring Advisor, areas for intervention were identified. Including:

Redesign of survey questionnaires to track the project impact on women (particularly on the female-headed households).

More comprehensive internal monitoring that addresses gender differences and equity.

Increased emphasis on training municipal commissioners and staff on how to

1. promote gender equity
2. raise gender awareness amongst the public
3. involve NGOs with the capacity to address gender-based needs in water, sanitation and solid waste management activities;
4. motivate contractors to employ women in construction and maintenance activities

To support these inventions, a project-specific GAD Action Plan was developed outlining gender mainstreaming activities, including the following features:

• Institutional arrangement to support GAD mainstreaming: appointment of a senior member of the consulting team as a GAD focal point to coordinate all GAD activities, including the preparation of GAD guidelines for LGED.

• Support for GAD in local governance: advocacy for the establishment of gender and environment committees within pourashavas to be chaired by women ward commissioners; capacity building of women ward commissioners; and recruitment of women as tax assessors, collectors and officers.

• Infrastructure design: design of markets and bus terminals to include facilities for women (e.g. separate female waiting room, toilets and booking counters, and increased security measures such as improved lighting).

• Employment for women: advocacy to urge contractors to hire women construction workers, and advocacy for the principle of equal wages for equal work between women and men.

• Training for women: ward-based training of women and men beneficiaries and ward commissioners in the areas of environment sanitation, solid waste management, health and hygiene, and the maintenance of pit latrines, tubewells and public toilets.

• Gender awareness training for senior project staff: training to increase awareness of ADB's GAD policy, the national policy for the development of women, the government's national action plan for GAD, and basic GAD concepts.

• Gender-sensitive monitoring and evaluation: adoption of gender-disaggregated indicators; redesign of the household survey questionnaire; updating of the pourashava yearbook to improve its gender focus.

• Recruitment of a gender specialist during the initial years of implementation.

Policy Dialogue

The GAD Specialist has also been instrumental in bringing gender issues into the area of policy dialogue between the government and ADB. For example, the lack of clear Terms of Reference for ward commissioners in municipal councils is an issue that may create problems for ward commissioners in terms of competing GAD and other priorities. Furthermore, the recent Local Government Review Commission formed to review the local government system has bypassed municipal governance. The lack of emphasis from the government's side on the implementation of the National Action Plan and the National Policy for the Advancement of Women's Development has also been noted.

Technical Assistance

To support this project and other urban infrastructure projects, the GAD Specialist developed a sub project, Integrating Gender and Development in Municipal Work (funded under RETA 5889). This project aims to achieve a better understanding of areas where women can play a role as citizens and as local representatives, and the type of support municipalities can provide. It will also contribute to the design of gender components in the next phase of the Secondary Towns Infrastructure Development Project.

The general conclusion drawn from this project is that a commitment to gender must be reinforced during implementation by (a) including specific design features that address gender issues in the overall project design; (b) ensuring a continued discussion of gender issues across all project components, and (c) adopting appropriate accountability and incentive mechanisms as needed. A more effective measure however would be the early appointment of a GAD consultant as part of the project team responsible for designing and implementing a GAD Action Plan that takes into account these three areas.