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Job Description
For every child, a safe environment
The South Sudan humanitarian crisis continues to affect millions of children, remaining one of the largest, most volatile in the world. The pace of displacement has been significant, with nearly 2 million people currently estimated to be internally displaced, 9.3 million people are in need, of which, half are children. With this scale of humanitarian need, the affected population continue to require a broad range of life-saving and specialized assistance.
WASH needs currently exist for over 75 per cent of the total population. South Sudan is also currently responding to a national Cholera Outbreak.
How can you make a difference?
A WASH Cluster Coordinator is required to support a coherent, strategic, coordinated, effective and efficient system of partnerships to maximize reach, with limited resources; ensuring that those in need are well served, at standard, by WASH partners. On behalf of UNICEF as the lead agency for the IASC Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Cluster, and in collaboration with the State Authorities, provide leadership and facilitate the processes that will ensure a well-coordinated, coherent, strategic, and effective WASH response in South Sudan. In support of the national government, function as an interface between humanitarian WASH partners and duty bearers to ensure WASH related needs of the affected population are met.
MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES AND TASKS
The key functions are aligned with the IASC Cluster Coordination functions and minimum requirements (MRs) for coordination at country level. The MRs are designed to provide a light-approach mechanism to monitor WASH humanitarian platforms (clusters or sectors) at the country level.
Inclusion of key humanitarian partners:
Coordination
Provide a platform that ensures service delivery is driven by the Humanitarian Response Plan and strategic priorities.
Developing mechanisms to eliminate duplication of service delivery.
Ensure the inclusion of key WASH humanitarian partners in a way that respects their mandates and programme priorities, as well as national and local authorities, other governmental actors, civil society and other actors working and related to the WASH sectoral response.
Needs assessment, analysis and strategy development
Ensure effective and coherent WASH assessment, analysis and feedback involving all relevant partners, including the identification of gaps and conceptualize how sectoral needs can be met through collective delivery, involving all relevant partners and ensuring complementarity of their actions.
Identify and find solutions for (emerging) gaps, obstacles, duplication and cross-cutting issues.
Formulate priorities based on analysis.
Participatory and community-based approaches:
Ensure utilization of participatory and community-based approaches in WASH related assessments, analysis, planning, monitoring and response.
Accountability to Affected Population
Ensuring that women, men, girls and boys of all ages and diversity backgrounds, affected by a crisis have equitable and meaningful access to:
Appropriate, relevant and timely information
Two-way communications channels that facilitate feedback and complaints and provide redress for complaints.
Means to participate in decisions that affect them, including fair and transparent systems of representation; and active involvement in the design, monitoring and evaluation of the goals and objectives of programmes.
Attention to priority cross-cutting issues:
Ensure integration of agreed priority cross-cutting issues in WASH assessments, analysis, planning, monitoring and response (e.g. age, diversity, environment, gender, HIV/AIDS and human rights).
Ensure specific cluster/sector focal points for cross-cutting issues identified, are equipped, and capacitated to lead on the cross-cutting area.
Emergency preparedness:
Ensure adequate WASH related contingency planning and preparedness for potential significant changes in the nature of the emergency and for high risk or recurring disasters (for example Floods).
Identify hazard, assessment and monitoring of risk is undertaken as part of the Humanitarian Programme Cycle or on a needs basis and reflected into the national WASH Cluster contingency plans.
Ensure that core pipeline is adequately replenished, gaps managed.
Planning and strategy development:
Develop sectoral plans, objectives and indicators that directly support realization of the overall response’s strategic objectives.
Apply and adhere to common standards and guidelines.
Clarify funding requirements, help to set priorities, and agreeing cluster contributions to the HC’s overall humanitarian funding proposals.
Application of standards:
Ensure that WASH cluster/sector participants are aware of relevant policy guidelines, technical standards and relevant commitments that the Government/concerned authorities have undertaken under international human rights law.
Ensure that WASH responses are in line with existing policy guidance, technical standards, and relevant Government human rights legal obligations.
Ensure critical WASH issues are identified and brought to the attention of the relevant stakeholders
Monitoring and reporting:
Ensure adequate monitoring mechanisms are in place to review impact of WASH interventions and progress against implementation plans. This specifically needs to include an analytical interpretation of best available information to benchmark progress of the emergency response over time.
Measure progress against the cluster strategy and agreed results and recommend corrective action where necessary.
Ensure mechanisms are in place to monitor the quality of WASH services delivered to the affected population against established standards (relevance, quantity, quality, continuity of WASH services)
Advocacy and resource mobilization:
Identify core WASH advocacy concerns, including resource requirements, and contribute key messages to broader advocacy initiatives of the HC, UNICEF and other actors.
Act as the media spokesperson for the sector.
Advocate for donors to fund WASH actors to carry out priority WASH activities in the sector concerned, while at the same time encouraging WASH actors to mobilize resources for their activities through their usual channels.
Training and capacity building:
Identify capacity gaps and needs of the WASH cluster/sector partners, including government and development capacity development action plan and initiative.
Promote and support training of WASH humanitarian personnel and capacity building of humanitarian partners, based on the mapping and understanding of available capacity.
Support efforts to strengthen the WASH capacity of the national/local authorities and civil society.
Transition planning
Lead on the design of appropriate transition strategies for the cluster to ensure continuity between the humanitarian response, recovery and development phases and disaster risk reduction initiatives. Ideally this will involve working closely with national counterparts and development actors to ensure a resumption of national ownership of cluster activities. It will also involve consideration of how coordination mechanisms and cluster membership should change as the humanitarian emergency subsides.
Advocate for provision of assistance or services as a last resort:
Where critical gaps in addressing WASH priorities are identified the WASH Cluster Coordinator will:
Lobby for implementing humanitarian partners (including UNICEF) to address the gaps.
With advice/support from the HC and support from other humanitarian partners will advocate, as appropriate, on the adequate provision of resources and safe access.
If persistent gaps remain then with the full support of the UNICEF Country Representative will specifically request that the UNICEF take action to fill the critical gaps through direct implementation action, where funds and access allow.
To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…
Minimum requirements:
Education:
Advanced university degree qualification desirably in subjects/ areas of WASH e.g. Health Promotion or Education, Civil or Public Health Engineering, Public Health (MPH), Environmental Health.
Work Experience:
Eight years relevant professional experience in the WASH programmes which should include:
At least five years direct WASH emergency experience at least four of which would be based in the field at a Team Leader/WASH programme management level.
A minimum of 2 years’ experience of responding to first phases of an emergency.
A minimum of 5 years’ experience with either the UN and/or NGO.
Language Requirements:
Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.
Desirables:
Developing country work experience and/or familiarity with emergency.
Experience of leading WASH cluster / sector coordination is an asset.
Advertised: E. Africa Standard Time Deadline: E. Africa Standard Time
About the Organization
UNICEF is out to change the world for children vaccination by vaccination, blanket by blanket, biscuit by biscuit, book by book. In most of America, these things are considered completely ordinary. But in many parts of the developing world, they can save a child's life.
UNICEF is unique among world organizations and unique among those working with young people. As a global movement, we use our authority to influence decision makers and diverse partners to turn the most innovative ideas into reality. In 155 countries and territories, UNICEF's field staff uses hard-won expertise to meet the challenges facing children and those who care for them.
Our history has given us a profound understanding of development and the importance of child health, education, equality and protection in advancing humanity. All that we do helps children realize their full potential.
In support of UNICEF's work, the U.S. Fund for UNICEF focuses on five major priorities: education, emergencies, HIV/AIDS, immunization and malnutrition.
