Senior Municipal/Infrastructure/Public Utility Finance Expert (KE3)

Job Description

Project title: Technical Assistance to Support the African Sustainable Cities Initiative (ASCI)

Brief description: The overall objective of ASCI is to enhance access to finance for investment for secondary cities in Sub-Saharan Africa, and so contribute to the delivery of several of the SDGs, including in particular SDG 11, and to the New Urban Agenda. Localising the SDGs is key to their implementation and, given the increasing rate of urbanisation, cities are at the centre of the UN 2030 Agenda. ASCI will support this goal through focusing on secondary cities in Sub-Saharan Africa. Secondary cities have been chosen as the focus of this TA operation because they generally have high needs and lower capacities, and donor funds tend to target larger cities.

In the context of this TA operation, finance for investment for secondary cities refers to a wide range of credit structures. These structures may be made possible through the use of sovereign or donor-funded guarantees, and blended finance instruments such as first loss grants or investment grants.

The purpose of ASCI is to enable a selected number of secondary cities in Sub-Saharan Africa to better access finance for their sustainable urban infrastructure needs through an integrated, planning-led, multi-sector approach. The TA operation will provide capacity development support to the selected secondary cities, develop municipal financing strategies, foster greater access to investors, and provide advisory support targeted to specific projects. Some of these projects could potentially be financed by the EIB or others in the future, possibly after further later-stage technical assistance.

Results to be achieved:

• R1.1: Four countries and ten cities are identified for the TA operation
• R2.1: Local governments of the participating cities have received support to identify and decide on a priority list of investments and identified key barriers to those investments;
• R2.2: A capacity building programme is developed and implemented to enhance the capacity of local governments to understand municipal finance, the financing structures and funding sources available to them, and the importance of key integrated sustainable planning principles;
• R3.1: At least fifteen sustainable urban infrastructure projects receive dedicated financial advisory services;
• R3.2: Additional technical assistance sources, such as EIB managed funds or external sources, are identified and funding applications are prepared;
• R3.3: Terms of reference are developed for further preparatory work that needs to be undertaken on the selected projects;
• R4.1: Knowledge sharing activities are developed and undertaken to share best practices and lessons learnt;
• R4.2: Local governments are assisted to access potential investors and to develop realistic and sustainable financing plans for their projects.

Commencement date of the project: September 2020 (tentative)

Duration of the assignment: 410 working days over 36 months

Requirements:

Qualifications and skills:

- At least a university degree in a field relevant to this TA operation (e.g. finance, business, engineering);

- MBA or CFA would be an advantage;

- Fluency in spoken and written English is required. Working level in French constitute an advantage.

General professional experience:

- 8 years of experience in identifying, evaluating, and developing potential investment opportunities, with a focus on investments in cities;

- 8 years of experience in structuring municipal/public utility and infrastructure financing transactions in emerging and developing markets, including determining procurement and delivery methods;

- Familiarity with DFI policies and processes is required, prior experience with or working in DFIs would constitute an advantage;

- At least 5 years of professional experience in Sub-Saharan Africa relating to infrastructure investment or evaluating investment opportunities.

Specific professional experience:

- At least two (2) professional experiences demonstrating quantitative analytical capabilities and ability to build financial models;

- At least two (2) professional experiences demonstrating advanced financial, credit, and risk evaluation skills;

- Strong existing relationships with project developers, investors and technical and legal consultants in the infrastructure pace as evidenced by prior work experience involving these actors would constitute an advantage;

- Practical experience of working directly with cities in Africa would constitute an advantage.