Researcher

Contract

This is a IPSA-8 contract. This kind of contract is known as International Personnel Services Agreement. It is normally internationally recruited only. It usually requires 1 years of experience, depending on education. More about IPSA-8 contracts.

Background

Instructions to Applicants: Click on the "Apply now" button. Input your information in the appropriate Sections: personal information, language proficiency, education, resume and motivation. Upon completion of the first page, please hit "submit application" tab at the end of the page. Please ensure that CV or P11 and the Cover letter are combined in one file.

Personal CV or P11, indicating all past positions held and their main underlying functions, their durations (month/year), the qualifications, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the Candidate, and at least three (3) the most recent professional references of previous supervisors. References may also include peers.

A cover letter (maximum length: 1 page) indicating why the candidate considers him-/herself to be suitable for the position.

Managers may ask (ad hoc) for any other materials relevant to pre-assessing the relevance of their experience, such as reports, presentations, publications, campaigns or other materials.

Travel:

1. UNDP will cover the cost of travel of the individual to the duty station, as well as their return to their home upon completion of their services. Travel costs are covered only in the event that the function will be undertaken physically in the duty station and excludes working from home arrangements.
2. Any travels related to official performance of duties will be covered by UNDP.

Office/Unit/Project Description

The International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth (IPC-IG) is a joint project of the United Nations Development Programme and the Brazilian Government. It was created with the objective of promoting the exchange of experiences, knowledge and technical and institutional capacities for the design, formulation and evaluation of development policies that contribute to inclusive growth, poverty and inequality reduction and human development. The Institute for Applied Economic Research (Ipea), a think-tank under the Ministry of Economy, is the focal point of the Brazilian Government at the IPC-IG. Ipea also physically hosts the IPC-IG and contributes through the participation of its researchers in the Centre’s activities.

Since 2004 the Centre has been providing advisory services to countries worldwide, receiving study tours, hosting international research fellows and interns, facilitating capacity strengthening and knowledge-sharing through training, conferences and various publication series, as well as building networks of researchers and practitioners on development policies.

Until now, the IPC-IG has carried out more than 120 projects with over 65 partners. These projects are grouped around the Centre’s three pillars: knowledge production, knowledge-sharing, and capacity-strengthening. They span a wide range of subjects covering five thematic areas: social protection; inclusive growth; technological innovation; sustainable development; poverty and living standard measurement and poverty reduction policies.

On the knowledge production pillar, the Centre has a focus on producing high quality research that inform policy recommendations for inclusive growth and that is also used to support evidence-based South-South exchange and learning. The Centre regularly publishes Working Papers, Policy Research Briefs, One Pagers and its flagship publication, Policy in Focus, to encourage policy debate and dissemination of knowledge.

The objective of this consultancy is to develop research products that can feed into the deliverables of the on-going collaboration between the IPC-IG and the UNICEF Regional Office for South Asia (ROSA). The IPC-IG has been working with UNICEF ROSA to produce a set of comparable studies on the state of social protection in the South Asia region. Such collaboration has already resulted in a set of papers assessing the most important features of flagship social protection programmes in the region, including their legal framework, child and gender sensitive features, as well as shock-responsiveness to the COVID-19 crisis. To continue this collaboration, the IPC-IG needs to elaborate the following set of deliverables a) ex-ante coverage simulations of cash transfer proposals in India (based on available DHS microdata); b) a series of One Pagers summarizing the core social protection features for each of the eight countries of the region.

The researcher will be working under the supervision of an IPC-IG Project Research Coordinator.

Duties and Responsibilities

In line with the abovementioned objectives, the researcher will provide the following services:

1. For the simulation of a cash transfer programme for India, the researcher will:

• Obtain access to India’s latest DHS survey (microdata);
• Develop a programme (do file) in Stata with different scenarios for : (i) eligibility criteria; (ii) value of benefits and estimates (i) the absolute number of individuals and households to be covered by the new cash transfer programme (ii) the annual cost of one such programme (excluding administrative costs).

• Generate illustrative tables with the abovementioned values considering a poverty threshold that defines the poorest wealth quintile and a benefit value equivalent to the average extreme poverty gap in the country (considering the US$ 1.90 PPP 2011 threshold)

  2. For the elaboration of the One Pager series, the researcher will:

• Read and summarize the country-specific takeaways of the recent IPC-IG publications available through the following websites:https://socialprotection.org/discover/blog/unicef-and-ipc-ig-paper-series-regular-social-protection-landscapes-south-asia and https://socialprotection.org/discover/blog/unicef-and-ipc-ig-paper-series-covid-responsive-social-protection-landscapes-south;

• Update the information assessed in the abovementioned recently published work;
• Make sure to include in the One Pagers the relevant takeaways from a forthcoming Impact Evaluation review undertaken by the IPC-IG;
• Liaise with UNICEF Social Protection specialists of the 8 South Asian countries to validate the One Pager summaries and edit according to feedbacks by partners before publishing it online.

Competencies

UN CORE VALUES AND COMPETENCIES

Professionalism: Shows pride in work and achievements; demonstrates professional competence and mastery of subject matter; is conscientious and efficient in meeting commitments, observing deadlines and achieving results; is motivated by professional rather than personal concerns; shows persistence when faced with difficult problems or challenges; remains calm in stressful situations. Takes responsibility for incorporating gender perspectives and ensuring the equal participation of women and men in all areas of work.

Communication: Speaks and writes clearly and effectively; Listens to others, correctly interprets messages from others and responds appropriately; Asks questions to clarify and exhibits interest in having two-way communication; Tailors language, tone, style and format to match the audience; Demonstrates openness in sharing information and keeping people informed.

Client Orientation: Considers all those to whom services are provided to be "clients " and seeks to see things from clients' point of view; Establishes and maintains productive partnerships with clients by gaining their trust and respect; Identifies clients' needs and matches them to appropriate solutions; Monitors ongoing developments inside and outside the clients' environment to keep informed and anticipate problems; Keeps clients informed of progress or setbacks in projects; Meets timeline for delivery of products or services to client.

Required Skills and Experience

Min. Academic Education

Master’s Degree in Economics, statistics, population studies (demography), social science or related areas.

Min. years of relevant Work experience

At least 1year of academic or professional experience in quantitative research

Desired additional skills and competencies

• Working experience at or for (1) the United Nations or other International Organizations;?(2) research institute or university.
• Working and/or academic experience in conducting econometric analysis (to be verified from academic, research, working experience and the list of publications in P11/CV, hyperlinks should be provided);
• Working and/or academic experience in analyzing social protection systems (to be verified from academic, research, working experience and the list of publications in P11/CV, hyperlinks should be provided). Focus on South Asia is a plus.
• Knowledge of statistical packages (e.g., Stata, R, etc)
• Writing skills: one sample of analytical tex about social protection issues in a developing country (e.g., draft academic paper; draft policy brief – hyperlinks should be provided. Short-listed candidates with a minimum of 56 points (70%) in the 5 previous criteria, would have their writing sample assessed).

Required Language(s) (at working level)

Fluency in written and spoken English and in a second UN language proven by certificate, personal or working experience abroad