Programme Associate: Resilience and Climate Change

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WFP seeks candidates of the highest integrity and professionalism who share our humanitarian principles.

Selection of staff is made on a competitive basis, and we are committed to promoting diversity and gender balance.

ABOUT WFP

The United Nations World Food Programme is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide. The mission of WFP is to help the world achieve Zero Hunger in our lifetimes. Every day, WFP works worldwide to ensure that no child goes to bed hungry and that the poorest and most vulnerable, particularly women and children, can access the nutritious food they need.

JOB PURPOSE

Background: Since July 2019, WFP Country Office in Palestine has been implementing a resilience activity called “Enhancing the resilience of vulnerable smallholders through climate smart agricultural livelihood” by providing some of the poorest and severely food insecure households across the West Bank and the Gaza Strip with a range of climate resilient agricultural assets in an effort to improve their immediate food security and nutritional needs. The assets range from hydroponic vegetable and green fodder production units, wicking beds, home gardens, floating beds, greenhouses to provision of livestock. Training and coaching are provided to the beneficiaries to boost their technical skills to effectively use these assets to produce, harvest and in turn consume fresh vegetable and produce fodder and sell any surplus to generate income to improve their livelihoods, increasing their resilience and boosting local food and fodder production.

The project is run in cooperation with the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) Ministry of Social Development (MoSD) and Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) and implemented in partnerships with the Applied Research Institute Jerusalem (ARIJ) in the West Bank and Oxfam and MAAN in Gaza. WFP and its partners successfully completed the first round of the experiments from July 2019 to March 2020 and started the second round in July 2020.

Through this activity and other on-going consultations, WFP seeks to further strengthen the capacity and resilience of the beneficiaries to produce safe and nutritious food and generate results as evidence to access additional funding e.g. Green Climate Fund and International Climate Initiative (IKI) to scale up the proven climate smart technologies.

To provide effective specialized support and technical analyses to policy and programme activities that effectively meet food assistance needs.

ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT

The Programme Assistant will be responsible for facilitating the implementation of the resilience activity in the Gaza Strip and will function as a liaison between the WFP Jerusalem office and Gaza office. The Programme Assistant will administer the day-to-day operations and follow-up on implementation in close cooperation with the project team in Jerusalem office, with the implementing partner and the relevant government ministries. The incumbent’s responsibilities include:

KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES (not all-inclusive)

Implementation and Follow-up on the Resilience Activity

• Provide technical support and assist in the development and implementation of a project referred to as the “resilience project”;

• Assist in preparing and updating of work plans for activities in the Gaza Strip, and follow up on the implementation;

• Liaisewith Gaza-based implementing partners and beneficiaries to ensure that all activities in the Gaza Strip are implemented and coordinated on timely and efficient manners.

Expansion of the Activity with the Private Sector and with Climate Finance Proposals

• Engage the cooperating partners and private sector in exploring opportunities and identifying potential marketing channels for beneficiaries’ surplus;
• Conduct extensive local research, develop new concept ideas and continuously share findings with the resilience project team;
• Search for and contribute to applications for climate finance.

STANDARD MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

Education:

• Bachelor’s degree in the area of agroeconomics, agriculture, economics, business, innovation, environment or climate change studies, engineering, or related studies. A Master’s degree in one of these fields is an asset;

• Expertise and experience in climate resilient /innovative agriculture (hydroponics, aquaponics, regenerative agriculture) and livelihoods and climate change adaptation; (at least 5 years of relevant experinace)

Language: Fluency in both oral and written communication in English

4Ps CORE ORGANISATIONAL CAPABILITIES

Purpose

• Understand and communicate the Strategic Objectives: Coaches team in the most effective ways to communicate WFP’s Strategic Objectives to WFP team and partners in the field.
• Be a force for positive change: Implements new methods or tools to improve team’s work processes and productivity.
• Make the mission inspiring to our team: Maps team’s activities and tasks to specific successes in beneficiary communities to showcase positive impact.
• Make our mission visible in everyday actions: Explains to teammates how each unit contributes to the overall WFP mission.

People

• Look for ways to strengthen people's skills: Identifies skill development opportunities such as training modules or on-the-job experiences for self, colleagues and direct reports.
• Create an inclusive culture: Facilitates team building activities to build rapport in own unit.
• Be a coach & provide constructive feedback: Facilitates the pairing of junior colleagues with coaches within own team.
• Create an “I will”/”We will” spirit: Proactively anticipates potential challenges and develops mitigation plans to ensure that team meets goals and targets.

Performance

• Encourage innovation & creative solutions: Identifies opportunities to be creative in own work and to help team be more innovative and accurate in their respective tasks and areas of work.
• Focus on getting results: Monitors team’s deliverables and provides feedback to ensure outcomes are delivered consistently and accurately.
• Make commitments and make good on commitments: Provides accurate guidance to team on expected responsibilities and tasks, whilst also upholding own commitment to the team.
• Be Decisive: Sets an example and provides guidance to junior team members on when to escalate issues when faced with challenging issues in the workplace or in the field.

Partnership

• Connect and share across WFP units: Facilitates partnerships with other WFP units to accomplish missions in the field.
• Build strong external partnerships: Sets an example and provides guidance to team on how to build relationships with external partners.
• Be politically agile & adaptable: Articulates to colleagues or direct reports the value of contributing to other WFP teams and agency partnerships in fulfilling WFP’s goals and objectives.
• Be clear about the value WFP brings to partnerships: Organizes, monitors, and prioritizes own and team’s efforts to ensure that they will fulfil the needs of internal and external partners.

FUNCTIONAL CAPABILITIES

Capability Name Description of the behaviour expected for the proficiency level Programme Lifecycle & Food Assistance Demonstrates ability to identify key variables and contextual factors that affect food assistance problems and programmes throughout the lifecycle to inform quality programme design or re-design. Transfer Modalities (Food, Cash, Vouchers) Demonstrates ability to implement, under guidance, food assistance programmes deploying the full range of transfer modalities with an understanding of basic principles guiding modality selection and implementation. Broad Knowledge of Specialized Areas Understands basic technical concepts and data and their relevance to food assistance programmes. Emergency Programming Displays capacity to provide inputs into the development, implementation and realignment of high quality emergency programmes. Strategic Policy Engagement w/Government Understands and applies basic principles of engagement with government counterparts at the national or local level.

OTHER SPECIFIC JOB REQUIREMENTS

• Expertise and experience in climate resilient /innovative agriculture (hydroponics, aquaponics, regenerative agriculture) and livelihoods and climate change adaptation;

• Expertise and experience in Cost-Benefit-Analyses (CBA);

• At least three years of experience in implementing and coordinating development and humanitarian projects, community and beneficiary mobilization, and liaising with project stakeholders;

• Demonstrated experience in establishing and maintaining partnerships with government institutions, UN Agencies, NGOs and stakeholders;

• Experience with carrying out field work in vulnerable communities with people from different backgrounds, economic situations and in food insecure communities; gender and age sensitivity;
• Experience in working for the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) Institutions and / or with international agencies is an asset

DESIRED EXPERIENCES FOR ENTRY INTO THE ROLE

• Strong time management skills with an ability to plan ahead, anticipate requirements, problems and obstacles, and an ability to juggle competing priorities successfully, and to work to tight deadlines;
• Ability to gather and process data and conduct cost-benefit analysis would be an asset;
• Very good communication skills in both Arabic and English (written and oral);
• Ability and capability to conduct field visits and travel through the Gaza Strip.

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS

24 December 2020

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Female applicants and qualified applicants from developing countries are especially encouraged to apply

WFP has zero tolerance for discrimination and does not discriminate on the basis of HIV/AIDS status.

No appointment under any kind of contract will be offered to members of the UN Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ), International Civil Service Commission (ICSC), FAO Finance Committee, WFP External Auditor, WFP Audit Committee, Joint Inspection Unit (JIU) and other similar bodies within the United Nations system with oversight responsibilities over WFP, both during their service and within three years of ceasing that service.