Call for projects – Gender and Social Inclusion At Helvetas

Call for projects – GENDER AND SOCIAL INCLUSION

The project “children and young people on the migration routes of North and West Africa” is financed by the Swiss Confederation, represented by the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs acting through the Directorate of Development and Cooperation (SDC).

The main objective of the project is to support countries in West and North Africa in order to have and apply a normative framework and national and transnational organizational capacities to ensure the protection of Children and Young People on the Move (EJM), access to education and the creation of opportunities for a dignified life.

• Effect 1: Beneficiaries

Children and young people on the move are better protected and have access to quality education; they have the skills and abilities that enable them to improve their chances and opportunities for a life with dignity

• Effect 2: Organizations

National systems and organizations are strengthened to provide better protection, education and socio-economic integration for children and young people on the move

• Effect 3: Policies

National laws and strategies are inclusive and based on children’s rights; they take into account the needs of children and young people in mobility through personalized care protocols

• Effect 4: Swiss profile

Switzerland stands out in terms of the rights of children and young people on the move and promotes these rights to States, coordination and governance bodies and partner organizations.

The project implementation approach follows cross-cutting themes, including Gender and Social Inclusion (GIS).

It is to meet this need that several initiatives were carried out, including a gender and diversity analysis in the two areas of intervention of the project.

The Children and Youth on Migration Routes in North and West Africa project ensures gender equity through access for girls and boys, young women and young people

This fund gives priority to “positive actions”, reserved for requests from initiatives and associations led by and/or directly benefiting girls, women and particularly vulnerable people/groups and will make it possible to:

• Support specific initiatives for and/or by girls, young women and marginalized groups, in order to reduce inequalities in access to services and decisions and increase their capacity to participate;
• Support a progressive change in behavior for equality among young people, young women, but also seniors, young men and institutions and services;
• Support the emergence of leadership from young people and young women;
• Advance knowledge on intersectionality relating to the mobility of children and young people and diversity in West and North Africa in order to provide guidance for adaptation and advocacy;
• Support advocacy initiatives for more inclusive systems ;
• Implement awareness-raising activities and training for teams and partners on gender and diversity and its implementation;
• Take on specific initiatives to promote the empowerment of women and marginalized groups.

Context of the intervention of the GIS fund in Tunisia

As reflected in the Gender, Inclusion and Diversity analysis, several groups of people within mobile populations, particularly children and young people, encounter aggravated difficulties due to their specific needs, resulting in an unsuitable or incomplete care process as a direct consequence. . These needs are either unknown, poorly understood or require high investment resources in comparison with the capacities of the care providers.

Faced with these challenges, the EJM project in Tunisia has decided to invest in a base of key stages in the care of these people with specific needs: Assessment, referral and support.

The needs of particularly vulnerable EJMs are better identified, thus allowing them to better direct people towards the services most suited to their specific situations encountered, thanks to evaluation methods, referral and support mechanisms sensitive to the specificities of target. It must be emphasized that significant efforts remain to be made so that existing referral circuits take into consideration the needs of particularly vulnerable EJMs.

The targets targeted by this intervention are divided into the following two themes:

• Mental health and psychosocial support (MSPSS); Children and young people in mobility and high vulnerability (Tunisians candidates for departure, returnees, internal mobility and migrants, asylum seekers and refugees) with behavioral and/or mental disorders (non-exhaustive list of potential targets: current drug users marginalized and precarious addicts, children and young people who have suffered psychological trauma, etc.)
• Single-parent family: Young girls, boys, women, men, migrants, asylum seekers, refugees, Tunisians on internal mobility, alone with dependent children

Objective of the intervention:

In Tunisia, the objective of the fund will be to support stakeholders towards better appropriation of care practices as well as mechanisms for evaluating and referencing particularly vulnerable EJMs linked to mental health and single parenthood in the areas of protection and/or education and/or transversally

Intervention logic:

Below is a non-exhaustive list of suggested intervention typologies and the desired strategic direction:

1. Areas of intervention: PROTECTION

Specific objective: Improving the evaluation of the referral and management of EJMs, particularly cases of violence (GBV, physical/sexual, etc.).

Expected results: The actors in the referral circuit adopt innovative assessment and/or support practices adapted to the challenges of particularly vulnerable EJMs linked to MHPSS and Single Parenthood themes.

Examples of interventions:

• Support for legal and care stakeholders in understanding specific needs.
• Raising awareness, training stakeholders in appropriate assessment and support tools.
• Development of community approach to case management.

2. Areas of intervention: EDUCATION

Specific objective: Support towards an inclusive learning offer in education and training systems (formal/informal).

Expected results: Particularly vulnerable EJMs linked to MHPSS and Single Parenting themes have better access to learning offers adapted to their specificities.

Examples of interventions:

• Development of specific/turnkey tools to support educational support actors in case identification and referencing.
• Establishment of community/professional whistleblower groups.
• Development of community learning groups.

3. Areas of intervention: TRANSVERSAL

Specific objective: Support care and referral actors towards policies including Gender and Social Inclusion issues.

Expected results: Stakeholders are committed to integrating gender, inclusion and mobility into their strategies, budgets and planning.

Examples of interventions:

• Support for directors of establishments (schools, accommodation centers, etc.) towards improving internal regulations and other documents in favor of better inclusion of EJMs with specific needs.
• This list of examples is not exhaustive; other types of intervention may be suggested.

Intervention zone :

The areas of intervention determined for this call are Greater Tunis and the governorate of Médenine.

Intervention budget:

Each theme has a maximum budget as defined below:

• MHPSS: 10,000 CHF
• Single-parent family: 10,000 CHF

Duration of the intervention:

This national call for applications will allow the selection of a local partner with expertise in GIS for the realization of relevant initiatives during the period from April 1 to October 31, 2024 (6 months of activities maximum).

Eligibility criteria:

Specific initiatives financed by the GIS fund must meet the criteria below:

• Respond to an issue linked to gender and diversity (reference to priorities identified on the basis of project analyses);
• Have impacts on project activities;
• Have impacts on the direct and indirect beneficiaries of the project;
• Involve key players in intervention areas;
• Be located in the project intervention areas;
• Be sensitive to conflicts (after identification of risks and development of a mitigation plan).
• Being a local organization of Tunisian civil society