Fund Dates

• Start Date: March 2019
  
• End Date: 31 March 2024
  

Reporting

• 2020 Consolidated Narrative and Financial Report / 2020 Certified Finanical Report
• 2019 Consolidated Narrative and Financial Report
• 2019 Certified Financial Report

Key Documents

• Elsie Initiative Fund:  Terms of Reference - Termes de Référence - Términos de Referencia
• Elsie Initiative Fund:  Covering Letter - Lettre d'accompagnement
• Elsie Initiative Fund:  Call for Letters of Interest - Appel à manifestation d'intérêt 
• Elsie Initiative Fund:  Barriers to Deployment - Obstacles au déploiement 
• Elsie Initiative Fund:  Memorandum of Understanding
• Elsie Initiative Fund:  Fact Sheet
  
• Elsie Initiative Fund: Technical Briefing and First Programming Cycle Presentations (9 July 2019)
• Elsie Initiative Fund: Standard Administrative Arrangment (SAA) Template 

Overview

United Nations peace operations, which help countries navigate the difficult path from conflict to peace, have evolved considerably over past decades to better respond and give voice to women, whose meaningful involvement have demonstrated to prevent, resolve and rebuild from conflict and contribute to longer-term sustainability. Yet the number and proportion of deployed women peacekeepers remains too low. Since 2015, the overall rate of women in United Nations peace operations has only increased from 4.2% to 5%. At the current pace, it will take decades to reach the levels outlined in Security Council resolution 2242.

Aiming at addressing this situation, key UN entities, led by UN Women and Department of Peace Operations, together with Member States have collaborated to establish “The Elsie Initiative Fund for Uniformed Women in Peace Operations” to support and incentivize the increased meaningful participation of uniformed women in UN peace operations.

Strategic approach and funding

This UN Multi-Partner Trust Fund seeks to accelerate progress towards achieving UN targets to increase the meaningful participation of women serving in uniformed military and police roles in UN peace operations, as stated in the Department of Peace Operation's Uniformed Gender Parity Strategy (2018-2028).

The primary recipients of the fund are troop- and police-contributing countries (T/PCCs), while UN organizations that wish to implement and test innovations will have secondary access. The Fund offers two streams of funding:

Flexible project funding. Allows UN Member States contributing troop and police personnel to peace operations and/or UN organizations to access financial assistance to support evidence-based activities and the deployment of trained and qualified uniformed women, over the short and long term. Examples of proposals through this funding stream are: training and mentorship programs for commanders and senior personnel, infrastructure investments, national recruitment campaigns to attract more women into service and training for women personnel who may deploy.

Premiums for gender-strong units.  Financial premiums to T/PCCs for the deployment of gender-strong units. A gender-strong unit is defined as a military unit or a formed police unit (FPU) that includes substantial representation of women overall and in positions of authority, has provided gender-equity training to all unit members, and has adequate equipment and other materiel to ensure parity of deployment conditions for women and men peacekeepers.

All projects must include robust internal monitoring and reporting procedures.

Specific risk and mitigation strategies will be developed for each project and will explicitly address the safety and security of all women military or police personnel to participate through the proposal.

Overcoming barriers

The Elsie’s Initiative Fund, named after Canadian women’s rights pioneer Elsie MacGill (1905-1980), aims at contributing to identify and overcome barriers to the deployment of trained and qualified uniformed women peacekeepers. These barriers include:

• Women are not given the equal opportunity to deploy in peace operations;
• Criteria for deployment exclude disproportionate numbers of women;
• Women are not provided with the necessary working and living environment, facilities and equipment to deploy to and fully participate in peace operations;
• Family constraints disproportionately prevent women from deploying;
• Women are not treated equally on deployment and they do not have equal opportunities and incentives for redeployment; and
• Women do not have equal opportunities for career advancement through deployment, either on-mission or at home.

While not all of these barriers can be addressed through increased financial resources, additional financing can help identify which barriers are most significant in their specific national context and allow testing innovations to address them. The Fund complements existing UN peace operations financing mechanisms and, as such, it will be the first instrument to focus specifically on the deployment of uniformed women in peace operations.

Governance

The management of the Fund comprises several levels:

A Steering Committee governs the Fund and provides strategic guidance for achieving the Fund’s programmatic objectives. It is composed of (3) UN members (Department of Peace Operations, Executive Office of the Secretary-General and UN Women); (4) Member States (Canada as founding member, a contributor to the fund, a member of the contact group and a T/PCC contributor). The Steering Committee is co-chaired by UN Women and Canada with final decision making by the United Nations co-chair. The MPTF Office, administrator and trustee of the Fund, participates as ex officio member. Agreement take place by, at least, two thirds majority.

The Fund Secretariat, hosted by UN Women, is responsible for the operational functioning of the Fund. It provides technical and administrative support to the Steering Committee and follows up on all aspects of the allocation and project cycles within the Fund.

A Technical Committee, consisting of technical specialists, assists the Secretariat on an ad-hoc basis.

The Administrative Agent. The Elsie’s Initiative Fund is administered by the UN Multi-Partner Trust Fund (MPTF) Office under the pass-through management modality and acts as a trustee of this UN pooled fund. As such, it is responsible for concluding the memorandum of understanding with Participating UN Organizations and Standard Administrative Arrangements with donors. The MPTF Office receives, administers, and manages contributions from donors, disburses funds to implementing partners, and consolidates financial reports produced by each implementing partner.

Implementing Partners. The Fund acts as a pass-through mechanism, transferring resources directly to T/PCCs and Participating United Nations Organizations (PUNOs), and thereby avoiding any duplication of operating procedures, and minimizing transaction costs. National governments can receive funding directly taking into account the eligibility criteria specified in the Fund’s Terms of Reference. Civil society organizations cannot apply independently and activities must be undertaken in partnership with, and under a proposal from, a T/PCC or participating UN