Cross-Cutting Theme

A cross-cutting theme is a development priority that a multilateral development bank applies across projects in all sectors rather than within a single industry. Common cross-cutting themes include climate change and resilience, gender equality and women's empowerment, governance and anti-corruption, fragility and conflict, and digital development. These themes shape what contractors and consultants are required to do beyond the technical core of their contracts.

What is a Cross-Cutting Theme?

Development banks designate certain issues as cross-cutting because they are too important and pervasive to be treated as sector-specific concerns. Climate risk, for example, is relevant whether a project finances a hospital, a road, or an irrigation scheme. Rather than creating a separate sector for each of these issues, banks embed them as mandatory lenses that all projects must address. Each project's theme-classification record lists the cross-cutting themes that apply, and these labels cascade into project design, safeguard documents, and eventually into the procurement documents and evaluation criteria for contracts under the project.

For contractors and consultants, a cross-cutting theme manifests as a specific requirement in the tender documents. A project with a gender theme may require the supplier to develop a gender action plan, report on female employment ratios, or facilitate gender-responsive community consultations. A project with a climate theme may require a greenhouse gas accounting methodology or specific materials and design standards for climate resilience. Understanding which cross-cutting themes apply to a project before writing a proposal allows a firm to prepare the right technical expertise statements and staff profiles.

Why Cross-Cutting Themes matter for bidders

Failing to address cross-cutting themes in a proposal is one of the most common reasons technically competent firms score below expectation. Evaluation panels for MDB-financed contracts are instructed to score proposals against all published criteria, including those derived from cross-cutting themes, and a strong technical section that ignores a gender or climate requirement will lose marks to a proposal that addresses it directly. Suppliers entering MDB markets for the first time should read the applicable environmental and social standards and the bank's thematic guidelines before preparing their first technical proposal.

FAQ

Are cross-cutting themes the same as sector classifications?

No. Sector classifications identify the industry the project operates in (such as Transport or Health). Cross-cutting themes are development priorities that apply regardless of sector, such as gender equality or climate resilience. A project record carries both a sector label and one or more cross-cutting theme labels.

How do I know which cross-cutting themes apply to a contract I am bidding on?

The terms of reference (tor) and the evaluation criteria in the request for proposals will list any requirements derived from cross-cutting themes. The project's environmental and social documents, usually publicly available on the bank's portal, also describe the themes in detail.

Do cross-cutting theme requirements affect price or only technical scoring?

Cross-cutting theme requirements primarily affect the technical proposal and the contract deliverables. However, they also have cost implications: preparing gender action plans, conducting climate risk assessments, or hiring specialists in governance or fragility adds to the cost of delivery and should be priced into the financial proposal.