Programme Assistant (Nutrition) at the United Nations World Food Programme

Requisition: 107855
Location: Maiduguri, Borno

Organizational Context
In the Northeast Nigeria states of Borno, Yobe and Adamawa, ongoing violence is affecting the lives and livelihoods of millions of people. The conflict continues to undermine social stability and economic development due to the scale of displacement, disrupted livelihoods and diminished agricultural production due to the protracted nature of the crisis, which has consequential impact on the food security and nutrition situations. Almost three million persons are facing hunger, and it is estimated that up to one-million children under five years may be acutely malnourished, and 1.1 million pregnant and lactating women require access to nutrition services. The insecurity is causing mass movements of people, with 1.92 million living in camps or host communities within Nigeria, and tens of thousands seeking refuge in neighbouring countries. Many of those who left the country are now returning, and need food, shelter and support for livelihoods.

Across the three affected Northeast states, the nutritional situation remains worrisome. It is estimated that almost 1.1 million children 6 to 59 months in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa States are acutely malnourished; acute malnutrition is attributed as a key factor in mortality amongst children under five. State-level global acute malnutrition rates for children 6 to 59 months were 13.3 percent in Yobe, 10.6 percent  in Borno, and 6.5 percent in Adamawa, and remain at serious levels in several domains, particularly in Yobe and Borno states where GAM rates were highest in Northern Yobe (16.1 percent), and in Central Yobe, and Northern Borno at 14 percent. Rates of stunting in these children range from 27 to 32 percent, and underweight from 15 to 24 percent. Moreover, only 27 to 35 percent of infants up to 6 months are exclusively breastfed, and just 1 to 3 percent of children 6 to 23 months receive a minimum acceptable diet reflecting the general poor infant and young child feeding practices in the Northeast. Drivers of malnutrition are poor dietary diversity, and low rates of exclusive breastfeeding, particularly in Yobe, increased incidence of common childhood illnesses such as fever, diarrhoea, and respiratory illness, and poor WASH practices.

Job Purpose

• Under its new CSP 2019-2022, WFP currently provides emergency nutrition and food assistance to more than one hundred thousand beneficiaries in Yobe State.
• The WFP preventative nutrition approach delivers both nutrition specific and nutrition sensitive interventions aimed at preventing and managing malnutrition amongst the most vulnerable populations: young children and pregnant and lactating women. With an emphasis on children under five years and women of reproductive age and highlighting the critical 1,000 Days ‘window of opportunity’, the WFP malnutrition prevention and treatment programmes aim to stabilize and improve the nutrition situation, and support multisectoral linkages with health care access, and improved water, sanitation and hygiene practices, underscored by the provision of IYCF and nutrition education and delivered through SBCC.
• To provide support to effective delivery of WFP Nigeria nutrition programmes and activities that contribute to meeting the nutritional needs of WFP beneficiaries.

Key Accountabilities (not all-inclusive)

• Support the WFP Maiduguri Area Office Nutrition Unit for implementation of the nutrition programmes, which includes supporting implementation and monitoring of all nutrition activities within the Area Office.
• Provide support to specific and defined WFP Maiduguri Area Office nutrition projects and activities, ensuring a co-ordinated approach with wider programmes/projects that comply with WFP standards and procedures.
• Track and analyse nutrition data to provide input into WFP Maiduguri Area Office reporting activities and contribute to the preparation of accurate and timely reporting on nutrition activities, including use of WFP corporate reporting tools, to enable informed operational decision making and consistency of (internal and external) information.
• Work and exchange information with internal WFP Nigeria counterparts to support effective collaboration, implementation and monitoring of ongoing nutrition activities.
• Liaise with WFP Maiduguri Area Office nutrition partners (internal and external) to monitor ongoing projects, ensuring effective collaboration, timeliness and efficiency, and highlight potential risks to project delivery.

4Ps Core Organisational Capabilities
Purpose:

• Understand and communicate the Strategic Objectives: Helps teammates articulate WFP’s Strategic Objectives.
• Be a force for positive change: Suggests potential improvements to team’s work processes to supervisor.
• Make the mission inspiring to our team: Explains the impact of WFP activities in beneficiary communities to teammates.
• Make our mission visible in everyday actions: Articulates how own unit’s responsibilities will serve WFP’s mission.

People:

• Look for ways to strengthen people's skills: Trains junior teammates on new skills and capabilities.
• Create an inclusive culture: Seeks opportunities to work with people from different backgrounds.
• Be a coach & provide constructive feedback: Serves as a peer coach for colleagues in same area of work.
• Create an “I will”/”We will” spirit: Tracks progress toward goals and shares this information on a regular basis with supervisor.

Performance

• Encourage innovation & creative solutions: Explores ways to consistently be more efficient and accurate in own areas of work and shares new methods of work with colleagues.
• Focus on getting results: Focuses on getting results and tracks trends in completion rates for own tasks to identify opportunities for efficiency.
• Make commitments and make good on commitments: Takes responsibility for own tasks and notifies supervisor as soon as possible of potential delays in meeting deadlines or commitments.
• Be Decisive: Independently decides what action to take when faced with critical choices in the workplace or in dangerous situations in the field.

Partnership:

• Connect and share across WFP units: Suggests opportunities for partnering with other units to supervisor.
• Build strong external partnerships: Identifies opportunities to work with colleagues and partners in the field towards common goals.
• Be politically agile & adaptable: Develops an understanding of the value of WFP’s teams and external partners in fulfilling team’s goals and objectives.
• Be clear about the value WFP brings to partnerships: Aligns own activities with supervisor’s priorities to fulfill internal and external partner needs.

Functional CapabilitiesCapability Name-Description of the behaviour expected for the proficiency level:Programme Lifecycle & Food Assistance:    

• Can facilitate implementation of food assistance programmes under guidance using basic understanding of principles and good practices of programme design, implementation and monitoring.

Transfer Modalities (Food, Cash, Vouchers):

• Demonstrates ability to facilitate, under guidance, food assistance programme implementation that deploys full range of transfer modalities with an understanding of basic principles guiding modality selection and implementation.

Knowledge of Specialized Areas:

• Understands basic technical concepts and data andtheir relevance to food assistance programme.

Emergency Programming:

• Displays capacity to provide inputs into the development, implementation and realignment of high quality emergency programmes.

Strategic Policy Engagement w/Govt:

• Understands and applies basic principles of engagement with government counterparts at the national or local level.

Standard Minimum Qualifications

• Education: University degree in any of the relevant fields of Nutrition, Public Health, Food Technology, etc.
• Language: Fluency (level C) in English language. Knowledge of Hausa, Kanuri and other local languages is desirable.

Other Specific Job Requirements

• Support WFP Maiduguri Area Office nutrition representation in relevant nutrition and food assistance co-ordination forums, workshops and trainings, and provide support for regular meetings with government authorities, partners, and all other relevant stakeholders, as required.
• Provide support to WFP Maiduguri Area Office nutrition procurement, nutrition commodity tracking, and nutrition partnership contract processes.
• Follow standard emergency preparedness practices to ensure WFP is able to quickly respond and deploy needed resources to affected areas at the onset of the crisis.
• Other, as required.

Desired Experiences for entry into the role:

• At least two to three years of relevant technical experience in health, nutrition and/or food security programming.
• Experience in health, nutrition and/or food security information and data management and analysis.
• Experience with implementation of national/international development or emergency programmes.
• Experience identifying and defining nutrition issues/problems within a country.
• Working experience in Northeast Nigeria and within the U.N. system are assets.

Knowledge:

• Demonstrated well-prepared analytical work, well-managed programmes, and proven teamwork abilities, including communication and advocacy skills.
• Concise and informative writing skills, good communication skills, ability to plan and organize work under tight deadlines, and ability to work independently and efficiently.
• Excellent computer skills in MS Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint). Familiarity/experience with standard nutrition analytical software packages and systems (SPSS, EPI-INFO, ENA) is an asset.

Terms and Conditions

• Qualified female candidates are encouraged to apply.
• Only Nigerian nationals are eligible to apply for this position.
• Applications to be made online and in English only.
• Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.