ETC – Disaster Risk Management Specialist Full Time

Job #:

• req22232

Organization:

• World Bank

Sector:

• Other

Grade:

• EC2

Term Duration:

• 1 year 0 months

Recruitment Type:

• Local Recruitment

Location:

• Lilongwe,Malawi

Required Language(s):

• English

Preferred Language(s):

• English

Closing Date:

• 4/26/2023 (MM/DD/YYYY) at 11:59pm UTC

Description

Do you want to build a career that is truly worthwhile? Working at the World Bank Group provides a unique opportunity for you to help our clients solve their greatest development challenges. The World Bank Group is one of the largest sources of funding and knowledge for developing countries; a unique global partnership of five institutions dedicated to ending extreme poverty, increasing shared prosperity and promoting sustainable development. With 189 member countries and more than 120 offices worldwide, we work with public and private sector partners, investing in groundbreaking projects and using data, research, and technology to develop solutions to the most urgent global challenges. For more information, visit www.worldbank.org

GLOBAL CONTEXT

The Sustainable Development Practice Group
The Sustainable Development (SD) Practice Group (PG) helps countries tackle their most complex challenges in the areas of Agriculture and Food, Climate Change, Environment, Natural Resources & Blue Economy, Environmental and Social Framework, Urban, Disaster Risk Management (DRM), Resilience & Land, Social Sustainability and Inclusion, and Water.

The “Urban, Resilience and Land” (URL) Global Practice

Urbanization is occurring at an unprecedented pace. Cities generate 80% of global GDP and are key to job creation and the pursuit of shared prosperity. Yet one billion city residents live in slums today, and by 2030 one billion new migrants will arrive in cities. This concentration of people and assets will exacerbate risk exposure to adverse natural events and climate change, which affects the poor disproportionately. The absence of secure land tenure underpins deprivation and is a major source of conflict in the urban and rural space. One and a half billion people live in countries affected by repeated cycles of violence. In the absence of services, participative planning and responsive institutions, these trends will result in increased poverty, social exclusion, vulnerability, and violence. Finally, avoiding a 4-degree warmer world requires drastically reducing the carbon footprint of cities.

The WBG is in a unique position to support national and sub-national clients to: harness urbanization and enable effective land management in support of both growth and poverty reduction; foster social inclusion of marginalized groups; support the responsiveness and fiscal, financial, and management capacities of local governments – cities, municipalities, and rural districts – to deliver local infrastructure and decentralized services; strengthen resilience and risk management related to natural disasters; reduce conflict and violence; scale-up access to finance for sub-national governments; and reduce the carbon footprint of cities. The WBG brings a combination of lending ($7-8 billion in annual lending to cities), analytical and advisory services (e.g., social inclusion flagship, urbanization reviews, Sendai dialogue), its growing portfolio of reimbursable advisory services, its convening power (e.g., understanding risk and the land conferences), its leveraging capacity (e.g., guarantees and risk mitigation), and its ability to work with the private sector to tackle the challenges at scale and to effect.

The URL GP covers a wide gamut: (i) developing green, inclusive and resilient cities; (ii) enhancing urban and rural development through supporting and managing the urban-rural transition, assisting local development through developing land tenure, management and information systems; and (iii) assisting in disaster risk management through issues of risk assessment, risk reduction (including flood management, urban drainage, coastal management, and retrofitting of infrastructure), disaster preparedness (including hydromet services, early warning systems, and civil defense), risk financing (including CAT-DDO), and resilient reconstruction (including post-disaster damage and loss assessment).

REGIONAL CONTEXT

Urbanization in Sub-Saharan Africa is occurring at an unprecedented pace. The share of Africans living in urban areas is projected to grow from 38 percent in 2016 to almost 60 percent by 2040, translating to an additional 40,000 new urban citizens every day until 2040. The region’s urbanization rate, one of the highest in the world, can lead to economic growth, transformation, and poverty. However, many cities in Africa still have not fully captured the benefits of urbanization and poorly managed urbanization have exacerbated existing infrastructure challenges, resulting in increased inequality, urban poverty, proliferation of informal settlements and vulnerability to hazards. Adverse natural events present a serious obstacle for achieving sustainable social and economic development, particularly in vulnerable regions as Sub-Saharan Africa. Disaster affects the poor most severely; unplanned human settlements, unsafe building practices, high population densities, economic growth, and accumulations of assets in risk prone areas has dramatically increased exposure to hazards and increased disaster loss. Climate changed has the potential to significantly worsen the situation.

To this end, the AFR Urban, Resilience and Land Unit brings together a wide range of important and interrelated development and financing instruments to support national and sub-national clients to: harness urbanization and enable effective land management in support of both growth and poverty reduction; foster social inclusion of marginalized groups; support the responsiveness and fiscal, financial, and management capacities of local governments – cities, municipalities, and rural districts – to deliver local infrastructure and decentralized services; strengthen resilience and disaster risk management related to natural disasters; reduce conflict and violence; scale-up access to finance for sub-national governments; and reduce the carbon footprint of cities.

POSITION CONTEXT

Natural hazards have jeopardized development progress, contributed to macroeconomic instability and have a significant negative impact across sectors and provision of services that are key for human capital development in Malawi. Malawi is exposed to a variety of natural hazards, notably floods, strong winds, dry spells, cyclones, earthquakes, and landslides, which are known to cause both rapid and slow on-set disasters. Among the weather-related shocks, droughts and floods have had the greatest impact on the country’s economy, people’s lives and livelihoods, and infrastructure. The country has faced successive and compounding climatic shocks. The AFR Urban, Resilience, and Land East Africa Unit (SAEU2) is seeking a qualified and motivated professional to help deliver the ongoing and pipeline program of Malawi. In particular, she/he will support the management of analytical and advisory services, preparation and implementation support for lending investments, and policy dialogue in the areas of disaster risk management in Malawi.

Roles & Responsibilities:

The ETC – Disaster Risk Management Specialist is expected to provide technical and operational expertise to implement and develop the SAEU2 program in Africa with a focus in Malawi. The candidate is expected to carry out specific duties which will include, but are not limited to:

• Support the preparation, restructuring and implementation of the Malawi work program (including three operations and the Trust Funds associated to these projects, including working with Project Implementation Units.
• Contribute to and lead strategic analytic work related to climate change – focusing on both adaptation and mitigation – at the country and city level by adopting global best practices.
• Support the Malawi DRM Task Teams, and the Government to execute analytics and studies to identify opportunities including lending operations supporting urban resilience and DRM.
• Support and participate in task teams to deliver investment, programmatic and development policy lending operations, develop new business opportunities related to disaster risk management and help enhance the capacity of our clients to respond to DRM challenges through programs and projects.
• Review technical designs, terms of reference, specifications and participate in supervision of works.
• Help adapt global good practice in DRM, urban resilience, resilient infrastructure, risk assessment and green infrastructure to local contexts within Bank-supported projects and activities, including Bank-executed technical assistance.

Contribute to and lead the execution of lending and trust funded projects, including:

(i) lead or participate in missions and developing mission documents;

(ii) Develop Project Concept Notes (PCNs), Project Appraisal Documents (PADs), and other related project preparation documentation;

(iii) prepare and review terms of reference;

(iii) prepare implementation status and results reports;

(iv) prepare project briefs;

(v) develop funding proposals; and

(vi) presentations.

• Support the dialogue with and coordination among government counterparts and development partners in the urban/DRM sector.
• Provide support, as needed, to emergency response including contributions to various forms of post-disaster assessments, and to recovery and reconstruction planning.
• Participate in field missions in the areas of specialization, provide technical inputs and guidance to client counterparts as required by operational and analytical task team leaders.
• Provide technical leadership on projects in a dynamic environment.
• Support the reporting of Trust Funded activities and manage the activities.
• Draft technical notes, reports, Terms of Reference and policy documents; and
• Participate and support knowledge sharing activities across countries in the region and contribute specific knowledge both within the assigned countries and in the World Bank.

Selection Criteria

• Master’s or PhD degree in technical fields relevant to DRM and urban resilience such as civil engineering, hydrology, physical sciences, architecture, urban infrastructure and planning, disaster risk management, environmental planning, public management, or equivalent, and a minimum of 5 years of relevant experience in project management or infrastructure supervision.
• Experience in leading an interdisciplinary strategic planning exercise on a related topic (urban development, climate change, disaster risk planning or infrastructure planning).
• Extensive knowledge of urban development, climate change (adaption/mitigation), disaster risk management and local government in Africa.
• Experience working on flood risk management, risk reduction measures design or implementation is an asset
• Experience working on complex urban risk programs involving multi-stakeholder coordination.
• Demonstrated skills to engage and effectively lead dialogues with both local communities affected by urban risks as well as city leaders and decision makers charged with action.
• Strong conceptual and research/analytical skills with the ability to rapidly analyze and integrate diverse information from varied sources into conclusion and recommendations.
• Demonstrated effective communication skills, speaking and writing, and outstanding interpersonal skills, effective team member.
• Experience in donor-funded projects and/or project management in land administration / governance, sustainable landscapes, territorial development, or regional planning dimensions.
• Experience in development and delivery of educational tools to client countries.
• Excellent interpersonal skills and the ability to lead teams and function effectively as a member of a multi-disciplinary team.
• Proven track record of delivery of high-quality outputs while working under pressure, in a multi-sector environment, and within tight deadlines.
• Knowledge of World Bank operational policies, practices and procedures is an asset.
• Excellent and effective command of English in verbal and written forms required.

World Bank Group Core Competencies

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Note: The selected candidate will be offered a one-year appointment, renewable for an additional one year, at the discretion of the World Bank Group, and subject to a lifetime maximum ET Appointment of two years. If an ET appointment ends before a full year, it is considered as a full year toward the lifetime maximum. Former and current ET staff who have completed all or any portion of their second-year ET appointment are not eligible for future ET appointments.