Project profile — Women's Voice and Leadership - Response to Coronavirus (COVID-19) - South Sudan

• South Sudan (100.00%)

• Women's rights organisations and movements, and government institutions:
Women's rights organisations and movements, and government institutions (15170) (50.00%)
Ending violence against women and girls (15180) (50.00%)

• Gender equality (principal objective)
• Environmental sustainability (cross-cutting) (not targeted)
• Participatory development and good governance (significant objective)
• Trade development (not targeted)
• Biodiversity (not targeted)
• Climate change mitigation (not targeted)
• Climate Change Adaptation (not targeted)
• Urban issues (not targeted)
• Desertification (not targeted)
• Children's issues (not targeted)
• Youth Issues (not targeted)
• Indigenous Issues (not targeted)
• Disability (not targeted)
• ICT as a tool for development (not targeted)
• Disaster Risk Reduction(DRR) (not targeted)
• Nutrition (not targeted)

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the project is supporting women’s rights organizations (WROs) to combat the harmful effects that the pandemic response is having on women’s rights in South Sudan, including sexual and gender-based violence. This project is part of Canada’s Women’s Voice and Leadership Program, which supports local and regional women’s organizations and networks that are working to promote women’s rights, and advance women’s empowerment and gender equality in developing countries. This is done by supporting their activities, building institutional capacity, and promoting network and alliance-building, as women’s rights and feminist organizations are critical agents of change. The Program also responds to the significant, globally recognized gap in funding and support to women’s rights organizations and movements around the world. The project is implemented by CARE Canada, who is supporting an estimated 15 women’s rights organizations in South Sudan to pursue their agendas and priorities. The organizations are working across the former states of Jonglei, Central Equatoria, and Eastern Equatoria.

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) improved management and sustainability of local women’s rights organizations in South Sudan, particularly those representing vulnerable and marginalized women and girls; (2) enhanced performance of women’s rights organizations’ programming and advocacy to advance gender equality and empower women and girls; and (3) increased effectiveness of national and sub-national women’s rights platforms, networks, and alliances to affect gender-sensitive policy change and policy implementation in South Sudan.

Results achieved as of March 2021 include: (1) provided reliable, multi-year funding to 16 Women-led Organizations (WLOs) to pursue their own agendas and priorities; (2) supported the development of capacity building plans, tailored to the needs and priorities of the 16 WLOs, with training and mentoring provided in financial management, governance, prevention of sexual abuse and exploitation, human resources, advocacy, media communications, resource mobilization, proposal development and project management; (3) supported five WLOs in producing strategic plans and budgets that align with the priority needs of marginalized women and girls; (4) supported seven WLOs to develop resource mobilization strategies and successfully diversify their income sources; (5) provided Rapid Response Fund grants to an additional 16 WLOs to respond to the gendered impacts of COVID-19 and other urgent women’s rights issues; and (6) supported three women’s networks in launching multi-stakeholder advocacy platforms on gender equality issues, such as a new policy to end child marriage, the National Action Plan 1325 on Women, Peace and Security, COVID-19, sexual and gender-based violence, the constitutional commitment to 35% women representation across all levels of government, and WLO access to funding and participation in decision-making for humanitarian response. This has helped to improve the management capacity of the 16 partner WLOs, as well as their capacity to undertake programming and advocacy to advance gender equality. It has also increased the effectiveness of the three women’s networks to affect gender-sensitive policy change and policy implementation in South Sudan. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the project has supported 9 WLOs in combatting the harmful effects of the pandemic on women’s and girls’ rights in South Sudan, including sexual and gender-based violence.

• Proactive disclosure