Economist at World Bank

Roles & Responsibilities:

• The Economist will be an integral part of the Nigeria MTI Team, which comprises a Lead Economist, a Senior internationally-recruited (IRS) Country Economist, a Senior locally-recruited Country Economist, one other IRS Economist, and Consultants (currently, one Extended Term and one Short Term Consultant).
• They will also be part of the Nigeria Country Engagement Team comprising colleagues from the different practice groups and other senior global practice staff to ensure cross-cutting solutions to the core (typically multi-practice) country engagements around which Nigeria’s Country Partnership Framework and the country program is organized.
• Each core engagement utilizes different Bank instruments (ASA, policy dialogue, lending).

Responsibilities:

As part of the MTI Nigeria team, specific responsibilities of the Economist include the following:

• Co-lead the delivery of the Nigeria Development Update, the flagship biannual economic update for Nigeria.
• Lead the biannual Macro-Poverty Outlook for Nigeria, working closely with the Extended Term Consultant to update the underlying Macro Fiscal Model (MFMOD) for Nigeria.
• Produce the Weekly Update (distributed internally) on the latest economic developments in Nigeria, by closely supervising the work on this product by the Extended Term Consultant.
• Maintain, update, and develop macroeconomic databases, including by closely supervising Consultants.
• Lead or contribute to management briefings and MTI inputs for other teams (e.g., macro context paragraphs in program documents).
• Work on continual improvements to the team’s set of analytics for the Nigerian economy (e.g.,GDP and BOP forecasting, nowcasting, and macro consistency template).
• Support and participate in the policy dialogue on macroeconomic, fiscal, and monetary policy and economic growth issues with the country authorities; focus areas will evolve with policy developments and dialogue, but a strong initial focus on exchange rate policy reform is likely.
• Support macro, fiscal and debt ASAs including Public Expenditure Reviews (PER)/Public Finance Reviews (PFR) and Debt Sustainability Analysis (DSA).
• Support Development Policy Operations, or other types of lending operations focused on economic and fiscal reforms.
• Other country economist functions as required (e.g., coordinating the annual CPIA exercise).

Required Competencies

• Minimum of a Master’s degree in economics, with five years of relevant experience.
• A PhD would be an asset.
• Strong analytical skills in macroeconomic and fiscal management, and ability to conduct policy-relevant research.
• Integrative capacity including the ability to situate sectoral issues within a broader development framework.
• Strong oral and written communication skills, including the ability to present complicated analyses to non-specialist audiences.
• Strong client-orientation and diplomatic skills combined with candor and courage of opinion.
• Ability to work flexibly on a range of assignments and adjust to a variety of evolving tasks to meet often tight deadlines.
• A high degree of self-motivation, positive attitude and drive.
• Strong commitment to teamwork and knowledge sharing, with a willingness and ability to be part of a highly collaborative team.