Italy: Senior Social Protection Officer P-5

Organization: Food and Agriculture Organization
Country: Italy
Closing date: 19 Dec 2014

Organizational Setting

The Social Protection Division (ESP) coordinates FAO’s work on social protection, gender equality, decent rural employment, rural institutions and people’s empowerment. It is responsible for working with member countries and other partners to reduce rural poverty through strengthening social protection systems, diversifying rural employment opportunities, reducing gender gaps and other social inequalities in agriculture, strengthening producer organizations and improving the rural poor’s access to productive resources and rural services.

The post is located in the ESP Division in FAO’s Headquarters.

Reporting Lines

The Senior Social Protection Officer reports to the Director of the Social Protection Division, who is also Coordinator of FAO’s Strategic Programme for Rural Poverty Reduction.

Technical Focus

Conceptualize and develop guiding principles and policy tools aligning social protection interventions with food security and nutrition and broader agricultural and rural development policies. Implications for rural poverty reduction, gender equality and rural women’s economic empowerment, as well as links between social protection and sustainable natural resource and disaster risk management will be special areas of focus. In the technical areas mentioned, coordinate and provide policy support and capacity development and develop and apply ex ante and ex post impact assessments and research.

Key Results

Having developed and applied guiding principles and policy tools aligning social protection interventions with food security and nutrition and broader agricultural and rural development policies, paying due attention to impacts in terms of poverty reduction, gender equality and environmental sustainability in rural livelihoods. Having coordinated and provided effective policy support and having strengthened capacities of Member Countries in improving social protection for food and nutrition security and agricultural and rural development. Having contributed to resource mobilization and strengthened partnerships in order to enhance FAO’s work in these areas. Having prepared policy briefs and other knowledge products, and organized and participated in regional and country-level support programmes in line with the implementation of FAO’s Revised Strategic Framework.

Key Functions

· Plans, manages, or leads highly specialized or multi-disciplinary teams, leads, coordinates, and/or participates on Organization-wide, cross-Departmental committees, project teams, and working groups, and/or provides technical leadership/secretariat services on technical networks and/or international technical policy and standard setting bodies;

· Analyses global and country specific requirements as well as agricultural, economic, social, environmental factors to provide critical input into the FAO Strategic Framework, Programme of Work as well as Detailed Work Plans and the supporting budgets and/or resourcing strategies;

· Implements and monitors work programmes involving the conception and development of comprehensive statistical and/or analytical frameworks including early warning, medium and long term plans and strategies, leading edge tools, methods, systems and databases, critical indicators, and/or policy models, etc.;

· Oversees and reviews data collection, validation, analysis and reporting activities to support the development of technical standards, international instruments, innovation, FAO flagship publications/yearbooks, and/or on-going programme development as well as technical and/or policy advisory services;

· Provides technical and policy advice to Member Countries and technical support to decentralized offices in the development and implementation of their programmes of work;

· Plans, organizes and coordinates capacity development activities involving the provision of advice, technical assistance projects, training workshops, seminars, and meetings as well as oversees the development of related materials, on-line tools and information kits;

· Represents the Organization at international/inter-governmental meetings and conferences, advocates strategic partnerships, best practices, and increased policy dialogue and develops and negotiates effective working relationships/consensus and agreements with international and national partners;

· Leads and/or participates in resource mobilization activities in accordance with the corporate strategy.

Specific Functions

· Undertakes quantitative and qualitative policy analysis on effective social protection interventions that foster food security and nutrition and broader agricultural and rural development, paying due attention to impacts in terms of poverty reduction, gender equality and rural women’s economic empowerment and environmental sustainability. On this basis, conceptualizes and develops relevant guiding principles and policy tools to underpin in-country support to Member States

· Oversees, reviews and produces technical reports and inputs for technical documents, databases and departmental publications and web pages in connection with FAO’s core work on social protection

· Leads and coordinates projects and other activities of the Social Protection Team that provide policy support to Member Countries in the mentioned areas of work by providing technical, statistical, and/or analytical services on various studies, projects, and/or assessments and provides technical backstopping to field projects

· Promotes, defines and organizes joint work with key partners (including ILO, WFP, IFAD, UNICEF and the World Bank);

· Act as liaison with Regional and Sub-Regional Offices to ensure the necessary growth in social protection capacity in FAO's decentralized offices

CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING

Minimum Requirements

· Advanced university degree in international development, economics, institutional development, social policy , rural development or other relevant social sciences

· Ten years of relevant experience in socio-economic analysis, policy formulation, capacity building in relation to social policies and social protection, gender, poverty reduction, and/or sustainable development and disaster risk prevention.

· Working knowledge of English, French or Spanish, and limited knowledge of one of the other two or Arabic, Chinese, Russian

Competencies

· Results Focus

· Leading, Engaging and Empowering Others

· Communication

· Partnering and Advocating

· Knowledge Sharing and Continuous Improvement

· Strategic Thinking

Technical/Functional Skills

· Work experience in more than one location or area of work, particularly in field positions is essential

· Extent and relevance of experience in policy research, policy design and programme implementation related to social protection and its linkages to food security and nutrition, agricultural and rural development

· Ability to undertake socio-economic research, analyse data and statistics, and apply findings relevant to policies and programmes aiming to strengthen food security and nutrition, reduce rural poverty, empower rural women, and foster agricultural and rural development.

· Ability to mobilize resources and develop partnerships

· Extent of demonstrated professional writing and presentational skills, including for broad audience, as verifiable through international publications, policy briefs and OpEds

· Extent and relevance of experience in organizing international meetings, seminars and training courses

Please note that all candidates should adhere to*FAO Values of Commitment to FAO, Respect for All and Integrity and Transparency.*

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

· All candidates should possess computer/word processing skills.

· Evaluation of qualified candidates may include an assessment exercise which will be followed by a competency-based interview.

· Your application will be screened based on the information provided in your iRecruitment online profile (see “*How to Apply*”). We strongly recommend that you ensure that the information is accurate and complete including employment record, academic qualifications and language skills.

· Please note that FAO will only consider academic credentials or degrees obtained from an educational institution recognised in the IAU/UNESCO list.

· Other similar positions at the same level may be filled from this vacancy notice and the endorsed candidates will be considered for the Employment Roster for a period of 2 years.

· Candidates may be requested to provide performance assessments.

REMUNERATION

A competitive compensation and benefits package is offered. For information on UN salaries, allowances and benefits, click on the following link: http://icsc.un.org/rootindex.asp

How to apply:

To apply, visit the iRecruitment website at http://www.fao.org/employment/irecruitment-access/en/ and complete your online profile. Only applications received through iRecruitment will be considered.

Candidates are requested to attach a letter of motivation to the online profile.

Vacancies will be removed from iRecruitment at 23:59 Central European Time (CET) on the deadline for applications date. We encourage applicants to submit the application well before the deadline date.

If you need help, or have queries, please contact: iRecruitment@fao.org