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Tenders are invited for Consultancy Services for the Development of Great Lakes Youth and Women Economic Empowerment Project. Closing Date: 15 Jul 2026 Type: Consultancy Background Plan International is an independent development and humanitarian organization advancing childrens rights and equality for girls. The Middle East, East and Southern Africa (MEESA) Regional Hub provides strategic leadership, technical support, research, and influencing across more than 15 countries. The MEESA region is marked by conflict (e.g., eastern DRC, South Sudan, Ethiopia), recurrent humanitarian crises, economic marginalization of youth especially girls and young women, and entrenched gender inequalities and harmful social norms. Plan International MEESA drives regional priorities in Girls economic empowerment and employability, Gender-transformative programming and influencing, Youth leadership and feminist movement through strengthening youth and women-led organizations, and Humanitarian preparedness, response and resilience building. Plan International aims to reinforce its regional programming across the Great Lakes by addressing shared regional challenges that disproportionately impact children, adolescents, and youth, particularly girls. The region continues to face complex, interlinked issues including large-scale displacement, heightened protection risks, child marriage, teenage pregnancy, limited livelihood opportunities, climate-induced vulnerabilities, and persistent barriers to quality education and child protection services. These challenges transcend national borders and require harmonized, multi-country solutions. Although the countries in the Great lakes region present unique contextual dynamics, they are connected through longstanding socioeconomic ties, shared ecosystems, cross-border population movements, regional markets, common conflict drivers, and intergovernmental policy mechanisms. These linkages provide a strategic opportunity for Plan International to design an integrated programme model that responds to both national priorities and regional trends. This consultancy will support the development of a robust regional programme design and funding proposal focused on youth and womens economic empowerment across selected Great Lakes countries. The programme will leverage Plan Internationals comparative advantage in gender-transformative programming, youth-led approaches, and cross-country operational presence to deliver a differentiated regional model that integrates grassroots implementation with regional influencing and private-sector engagement. Purpose of the Consultancy The primary purpose of this consultancy is to lead the design and formulation of a comprehensive, multiyear regional programme proposal focused on youth and womens economic empowerment through inclusive and resilient valuechain development across the five focus countries. The assignment will articulate a coherent regional approach that diagnoses shared structural barriers and defines clear, scalable pathways for young people and women to access dignified livelihoods, productive assets, markets, finance, skills, and decisionmaking power within priority value chains. The consultancy will ensure that the programme design is firmly grounded in countryspecific and subregional contextual realities, while identifying areas where a coordinated regional approach adds clear strategic and operational value. Particular emphasis will be placed on countries where Plan International has an established presence, through close collaboration with Country Programme teams to draw on existing programming experience, analyses, evidence, partnerships, and lessons learned in youth and women economic empowerment and marketbased programming. For countries where Plan International has limited or emerging operational presence, the consultant will apply their technical expertise, regional networks, and secondary research capacity to generate robust contextual and market intelligence. The consultancy will lead to the development of an evidencebased regional programme framework, including a clear problem statement, theory of change, strategic objectives, and prioritized valuechain interventions that promote decent work, entrepreneurship, climateresilient livelihoods, and womens economic leadership. This will include identifying scalable and complementary interventions across production, processing, aggregation, market access, and enabling systems (e.g. finance, skills development, policy, and privatesector engagement), while addressing crosscutting issues such as gender norms, safeguarding, inclusion of marginalized youth, and conflict sensitivity. A core objective of the assignment is informed by the assessed priority needs of the targeted groups and aligned with strategic donor and privatesector partners priorities, translating Plan Internationals comparative advantages in gender equality and youth programming into a compelling, fundable regional value proposition. The final output will equip Plan International with a donorready regional programme proposal that provides a strong foundation for coordinated resource mobilization, strategic partnerships, and longterm regional engagement in youth and womens economic empowerment. Objectives of the Consultancy The overall objective of this consultancy is to design a coherent, evidence based, and donor ready regional programme proposal focused on youth and womens economic empowerment and decent job creation across agricultural and non-agricultural livelihood sectors, using an inclusive value chain and market systems approach. The specific objectives are to: Establish a strong national and regional evidence base by analyzing youth and womens participation in agricultural and non-agricultural livelihood sectors and identifying key barriers, opportunities, and pathways to decent job creation across priority value chains, including green and digital livelihoods. Analyse shared structural barriers, market opportunities, and regional value addition, examining constraints across skills, finance, markets, productive assets, decent work, and decision-making power, and identifying where regional, market systems pathways add value beyond standalone country interventions. Identify and consolidate scalable pathways for impact by mapping complementarities between replicable Plan International programme models, national strategies, and regional priorities, particularly in Uganda, Rwanda, and Tanzania, ensuring the regional programme builds on proven livelihoods, employability, and entrepreneurship approaches. Design a coherent and inclusive regional programme framework that translates identified barriers and opportunities into clear intervention pathways, including a problem statement, Theory of Change, results framework, and prioritized value chain and market systems approaches supporting wage employment, self-employment, and enterprise development across diverse and fragile contexts. Expected Outcomes A fully costed scalable regional programme proposal on youth and womens economic empowerment and decent job creation, developed through structured multi-country consultations and fully integrating gender transformative and inclusive approaches, safeguarding, climate resilience, conflict sensitivity, and youth leadership, and aligned with the priorities and compliance requirements of targeted institutional donors to enable effective regional resource mobilization. Scope of Work 4.1 Desk Review and Country-Regional Contextual & Livelihood Systems Analysis The consultant will undertake a structured desk review and contextual analysis to inform the design of a regional programme on youth and womens economic empowerment. This will include: Review of relevant Plan International global, regional, and country strategies, programme documents, project designs, assessments, evaluations, and learning related to livelihoods, employability, entrepreneurship, and economic empowerment. A country-specific and regional analysis of youth and womens participation in livelihood systems across: Agricultural and agri-business value chains; and Non-agricultural sectors, including services, MSMEs, manufacturing, informal economy, and emerging green and digital livelihood opportunities. Contextual analysis across all focus countries, with differentiated attention to areas with limited or emerging presence, informed by available data, literature, and Country Office inputs. Integration of a strong gender equality and social inclusion perspective, including assessment of structural barriers affecting young women and marginalized youth. Identification of key regional trends influencing livelihoods and employment, including donor and private sector priorities, labor market dynamics, climate-related risks, and fragility and displacement contexts. 4.2 Design Workshops and Stakeholder Consultations The consultant will: Facilitate a series of virtual multi-country programme design workshops with relevant Plan International programme, MEAL, influencing, and technical staff, as well as selected partners. Conduct stakeholder mapping to identify and analyse: Government institutions (employment, youth, gender, trade, and private sector development), Private sector actors across agricultural and nonagricultural sectors, Financial service providers, Local and international NGOs, research institutions Carry out bilateral consultations with selected stakeholders, including government actors, private sector partners, andwhere feasibleyoung women and men engaged in livelihood activities. Integrate multisector perspectives into a coherent regional programme design. 4.3 Development of the Regional Intervention Package Based on the analysis and consultations, the consultant will develop a comprehensive regional intervention package, including: A country-specific a Tender Link : https://reliefweb.int/job/4220237/terms-reference-tor-tender-no-2306fy26-consultancy-services-development-great-lakes-youth-and-women-economic-empowerment-project
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