REACH Nutrition Assessment Specialist for Afghanistan

BACKGROUND ON IMPACT AND REACH

IMPACT Initiatives is a humanitarian NGO, based in Geneva, Switzerland. The organisation manages several initiatives, including the REACH Initiative. The IMPACT team comprises specialists in data collection, management and analysis, GIS and remote-sensing. IMPACT was launched at the initiative of ACTED, an international NGO whose headquarter is based in Paris and is present in thirty countries. The two organizations have a strong complementarity formalized in a global partnership, which allows particularly IMPACT to benefit from ACTED’s operational support on its fields of intervention.

REACH was born in 2010 as a joint initiative of the two International NGOs (IMPACT Initiatives and ACTED) and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) Operational Satellite Applications Programme (UNOSAT). REACH’s purpose is to promote and facilitate the development of information products that enhance the humanitarian community’s decision making and planning capacity for emergency, reconstruction and development contexts, supporting and working within the framework of the humanitarian reform process. REACH facilitates information management for aid actors through three complementary services: (a) need and situation assessments facilitated by REACH teams; (b) situation analysis using satellite imagery; (c) provision of related database and (web)-mapping facilities and expertise.

We are currently looking for a REACH Nutrition Assessment Specialist (NS) to globally support our country REACH teams

Position: REACH Nutrition Assessment Specialist

Contract duration: 12 months

Location: Kabul, Geneva or Amman (with exact location to be confirmed)

Start Date: ASAP

FUNCTIONS

Under the supervision of the REACH Sectoral Senior Manager, the Nutrition Assessment Specialist is responsible for providing technical support and capacity building to REACH country missions in nutrition and health assessments, analysis and engagement, in coordination with HQ Research Department units, the REACH Global Director, and country missions. Through in-country support missions and remote support, the Nutrition Assessment Specialist will support in improving quality of programmes related to nutrition and health – across REACH country missions, work with REACH country focal points on work plans and solutions to identified issues, and design and implement guidelines and tools that address these same issues. While this position will support various country teams under its portfolio, it will have a particular emphasis for support to the REACH Afghanistan team in implementation of their planned MICS in 2022.

AFGHANISTAN PROJECT PROFILE

Given the critical nutrition needs the country is currently experiencing, and reflecting on the significant sectoral information gaps, REACH, in coordination with UNICEF, will be implementing in 2022 a Multi-Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS). The MICS will provide a much needed comprehensive nationwide source of women and children data, including anthropometric nutrition indicators for children under-5. By means of this assessment REACH will provide critical information to nutrition actors and coordination structures in Afghanistan for strategic and programmatic prioritisation and planning, including forming a baseline for the Transitional Engagement Framework (TEF), for UNICEF and a number of other UN agencies, and would provide data for key SDG indicators. To support the implementation of the upcoming MICS, the Nutrition Assessment Specialist would provide technical support, both remotely and with travel in-country, to the Afghanistan REACH team.

RESPONSIBILITIES

The primary responsibility of this position would be to provide technical support to REACH country teams in collecting nutrition & mortality related data, either in large population based surveys (MSNAs) or other ad hoc assessments. Additionally, the position would be responsible for leading capacity building initiatives for REACH staff on nutrition and health data collection methods and standards across various missions.

The position will cover multiple countries and may involve field travel (50% of the time). While supported countries will generally not be specified ahead of time, the position will have an emphasis of support to REACH Afghanistan during for at least an initial 6-month period for the 2022 Afghanistan MICS. The position will generally be under line-management from the REACH Sectoral Senior Manager at global level. During the period of time for support to REACH Afghanistan, they will be also line-managed by the MICS Research Manager and the Coordination in Afghanistan, the NS responsibilities’ will include the following:

Technical leadership

• Provide technical leadership and guidance to REACH country teams for collection of nutrition and health technical indicators, including but not limited to anthropometric indicators, infant and young child feeding indicators, mortality rates, childhood vaccination coverage, and more.
• Provide support to monitor data quality, analysis, reporting and dissemination of nutrition assessment data and results to REACH country teams, in close collaboration with in-country assessment and data staff.
• Take the lead in identifying training needs and planning capacity building activities for REACH country teams. This may include, but not be limited to, providing trainings, mentorship, identifying staff development opportunities and providing relevant resources as and when necessary. With support to Afghanistan team, may involve capacity building to external stakeholders as well.
• Specific to Afghanistan, lead the review of nutrition MICS protocols along with relevant tools such as electronic questionnaires, qualitative interview guides, data quality feedback mechanisms and others. Take lead in compiling and/or providing technical input and review of nutrition products from the MICS, organise and lead results validation or dissemination workshops, and support online publication of nutrition assessment products as needed. Provide ad hoc technical support to the Nutrition Cluster or the MICS team during the analysis of nutrition data or technical training upon request

Project development and implementation

• Provide support to country missions actively developing proposals or program strategies to implement nutrition data collection activities in their missions.
• Specific to Afghanistan, review MICS indicators, assessment methodology and sampling strategy;
• Support the development of project strategies, SOPs and tools that will facilitate the collection of high-quality nutrition data within the MICS project;
• Oversight of nutrition data processing, including development of data cleaning and analysis plans, and conducting analysis, in close collaboration with the in-country data team

Representation

• Representation in Global Nutrition forums including but not limited to the Global Nutrition Cluster and/or the IPC Acute Malnutrition.
• When necessary, may represent REACH at in-country Nutrition Cluster meetings or IPC Acute Malnutrition workshops, or other in-country engagements to support nutrition assessment planning or implementation.
• Specific to Afghanistan support, in coordination with the REACH Country Coordinator, Deputy Country Coordinator, MICS Research Manager, represent REACH during external engagements with MICS team, development partners, nutrition cluster, Information Working Groups, and other relevant coordination platforms. Additionally, serve as REACH’s focal point for nutritional technical engagements with UNICEF and other donors supporting the MICS

CONFIDENTIALITY

The Nutrition Specialist will maintain the strictest confidentiality on all data collected and related processes. He/she will actively take measures to prevent the unauthorized sharing of any information and data belonging to IMPACT and its partners, or collected during his/her assignment with IMPACT.

REQUIREMENTS:

• Excellent academic qualifications, including a university degree in a relevant discipline such as but not limited to Public Health, Nutrition, Epidemiology, Biostatistics, Statistics, etc.). A master’s degree in health, nutrition, nutrition epidemiology or related field is preferred
• SMART Survey Manager certification is highly preferred
• IPC Acute Malnutrition Level 1 training is highly preferred, or previous experience in IPC Acute Malnutrition analysis workshops.
• At least 5-7 years’ experience conducting nutrition assessments that using SMART methodologies and knowledge on other methodologies such as SQUEAC, IYCF, RNA is highly preferred;
• Previous experience with Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys (MICS), Demographic Health Surveys (DHS), or National SMART Surveys would be preferred.
• Training, certification, or relevant programmatic experience in other relevant nutrition topics (CMAM, IYCF, Maternal Child Health and Nutrition etc.) is considered an asset;
• Strong skills in Excel are required;
• Experience using statistical software such as Epi-Info, SPSS, STATA, or R is required;
• Experience using GIS software such as QGIS, ArcGIS, Google Earth is considered an asset;
• Experience designing data collection forms in Kobo, ODK, CS-PRO or similar mobile data collection tools is considered an asset;
• Prior knowledge of the Afghan context or experience working in a similar humanitarian context is considered an asset;
• Experience working closely an successfully with multiple partners including UN agencies is an asset
• High level of diplomacy
• Working proficiency in French would be considered an asset.
• Familiarity with the humanitarian aid system and UNICEF donor requirements and procedures is an asset.
• Familiarity with the Afghanistan context would be an asset.