Project to support gender programmes in Colombia

As part of the renewal of the bus fleet in Bogota with electric buses, the transport operators are looking for bus drivers trained in electric buses. The Municipality of Bogota has decided to seize this opportunity to feminise the profession and encourage women to use public transport.

Indeed, women tend to avoid public transport due to a feeling of insecurity. This makes public transport less attractive and leads to traffic congestion and additional costs for households (use of private transport).

With this project, Expertise France is helping the Mobility Department of the Municipality of Bogota to organise a 3-month training course which will benefit 93 women. It will make it possible to reclassify driving licences from B1 to C1 and from C1 to C2, which will allow the recipients to drive electric buses.

Since 2016, the National Planning Department (DNP) has been organising a national competition to select the best development plans for Colombia’s 32 departments and 1,103 municipalities. In 2021, the sixth edition of the competition aimed to reward the best territorial development plans for 2020-2023 and included the creation of a “gender” category.

The project aims to help the National Planning Department develop an evaluation methodology and conduct a qualitative analysis of the entries. Following this phase, technical assistance is developed to help the winning regional and local authorities mainstream the gender approach in public policies.

September-December 2021: Gender competition for territorial development plans

The first phase of the project consisted in evaluating gender mainstreaming in the territorial development plans based on criteria related to the planning and commitments of the Women’s Agenda on several lines of action:

• Economic empowerment and access to goods
• Participation in power scenarios
• Rural women
• Education and access to new technologies
• Sexual and reproductive rights and life without gender-based violence
• Institutional strengthening
• Actions to support the LGBTI community and promotion of women’s rights.

Three regional and local authorities won prizes: the Department of Valle, the City of Medellín and the Municipality of Curití.

January-April 2022: Assistance for regional and local authorities

The 11 winning regional and local authorities in the three categories of the competition (gender, territorial methods and environmental sustainability methods) were offered assistance in mainstreaming the gender approach in their public policies. This concerns: Valle del Cauca, Medellin, Curiti, Zipaquira, Trinidad, Vistahermosa, Encino, Uribia, Antioquia, Belen de Andaquies and Cali.

The technical assistance set up has conducted an assessment of gender mainstreaming in public policies and made it possible to adapt the activities depending on the capacities, needs and priorities of each authority. Customised capacity building activities have been organised at the individual and collective levels (focus groups, exchange workshops, individual workshops and webinars). Meetings between women’s organisations and government authorities have also enabled an exchange of experience and the formulation of general recommendations.

Two webinars to exchange international experiences have been organised on two themes prioritised by the regional and local authorities:

1. The mechanisms for mainstreaming the gender approach in public policies:

2. The prevention and management of gender-based violence in public refuges:

These activities have led to the preparation of a document on international good practices on mainstreaming gender in regional and local authorities.