Women and Girls for Change (Programme) SUMMARY 
The programme aims at building an empowering and inclusive environment, where women and girls feel safe and are enabled to realize their rights and opportunities, to play a significant role towards sustainable peace. It is implemented by a consortium led by Plan, composed of PAX, Healthnet and STAD, with in certain locations local implementing partners as AMA and EWO. It has been implemented since Nov 1st 2016  in Eastern Equatoria State ( Magwi and Nimule Payams) , in Lakes States ( West Yirol County) and in Unity State (Payijar County), until December 31st 2019. South Sudan has been engaged in a peace process for several years, where girls and women are often not considered, not as victims, nor as potential actors to build sustainable and inclusive peace. In the frame of the National Action Plan of the Dutch government to support the implementation of the UN resolution 1325, the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs funds programmes under the Women, Peace and Security funding. As stated in the Netherlands National Action Plan (NAP) on Women, Peace and Security 2016-2019, we believe women and girls can be/are crucial actors to foster sustainable peace in South Sudan. 
As concluded in our gender sensitive context, actor and conflict analysis women and girls in South Sudan are however hampered to fully contribute to sustainable peace processes due to: 
•	High levels of insecurity, where women and girls are often victims of sexual and gender based violence; 
•	A non-conducive environment, where women and girls are often structurally discriminated against and deprived of their rights; 
•	Internalized harmful gender norms, impeding women and girls to have a voice in decision making fora.  
This leads to a vicious circle as SGBV and exclusion from decision making are highly interlinked:  when women feel insecure, they are less likely to participate in peacebuilding processes, which will in turn lead to unequal rights and security needs being not adequately addressed.  
In this prospect, a multi-sectoral and multi-level approach is required, which will lead to more resilient and better protected women and girls (Result area 1 of our Theory of Change), the existence of an enabling environment for the promotion of gender equality (Result area  2) and meaningful engagement of women and girls in peace and security-related processes (Result area 3). This is a new project, building on activities related to psychosocial support, peacebuilding and prevention of GBV activities implemented by other actors. Beneficiaries are community members in the different locations. More specifically, women and youth as well asinfluential persons in the community will be targeted. Moreover, programme will strenghten capacities and learning between consortium members and their local partners. Training and mentoring of Psychosocial Focal points, Capacity Building of local Justics courts, Awareness raising on psychosocial distress  and women and girls rights. Training of fenmale and male gender advocate on gender and gender transformative processes, mobilization of youth to promote gender equality, community dialogues, capacity building of peace committees, lobby and advocacy, monitoring, evaluation and documentation It will be important to maintain the same key actors during the lenght of the project.  Ownership by the local community will be important as well :for that the local contexct and prevelent social norms have to be taken into consideration.