Programme Analyst, Local Resilience Full Time

Background

UNCDF makes public and private finance work for the poor in the world’s 47 least developed countries. With its capital mandate and instruments, UNCDF offers “last mile” finance models that unlock public and private resources, especially at the domestic level, to reduce poverty and support local economic development.

UNCDF’s financing models work through two channels: financial inclusion that expands the opportunities for individuals, households, and small businesses to participate in the local economy, providing them with the tools they need to climb out of poverty and manage their financial lives; and by showing how localized investments – through fiscal decentralization, innovative municipal finance, and structured project finance – can drive public and private funding that underpins local economic expansion and sustainable development. By strengthening how finance works for poor people at the household, small enterprise, and local infrastructure levels, UNCDF contributes to SDG 1 on eradicating poverty and SDG 17 on the means of implementation. By identifying those market segments where innovative financing models can have transformational impact in helping to reach the last mile and address exclusion and inequalities of access, UNCDF contributes to a number of different SDGs.

UNCDF has developed expertise and a portfolio of programmes addressing the issue of local resilience called the Local Resilience Programme (LRP), with a focus on building resilience to climate change, environmental sustainability and food security through local governments and mechanisms for local government finance. The centerpiece of the Local Resilience Programme is the Local Climate Adaptive Living Facility (LoCAL). In line with the recommendations of the Mid Term Review of the LoCAL facility the LRP consolidates the LoCAL mechanism itself and more recent work in the field of land restoration, municipal finance, urban resilience, coastal resilience and food security. It includes investments funded with local public finance and investments that have a blended finance component.
The Local Climate Adaptive Living Facility (LoCAL) is a mechanism to integrate climate change into local authorities’ planning and budgeting through the regular intergovernmental fiscal transfer system using performance-based grants in a participatory and gender sensitive manner, increase awareness and capacities to respond to climate change at the local level including through ecosystem based solutions, and increase the quality and number of local investments that address climate change. LoCAL combines performance-based climate resilience grants (PBCRGs), which ensure programming and verification of change expenditures at the local level, with technical and capacity-building support. It uses the grants and demonstration effect to trigger further flows for local climate action including global climate finance and national fiscal transfers. LoCAL also aims to support private finance for small and medium businesses and municipal finance and public-private partnerships. LoCAL is currently active in 14 countries in Africa, Asia and the Pacific. LoCAL operates a “quadruple check” methodology and measurement process for proven climate adaptation.

The recent mid-term evaluation of the LoCAL mechanism has called for LoCAL to expand its proven methodology, accelerating support to adaptation in urban areas, adaptation in coastal areas and private sector adaptation. The Mid Term Review also called upon LoCAL to improve its monitoring and impact measurement systems to enable the LoCAL mechanism and associated methodologies to become fully embedded in the global climate adaptation response.

Local Resilience Programme (LRP) combines performance-based climate resilience grants (PBCRGs) with technical and capacity-building support. PBCRGs ensure programming and verification of climate change expenditures at the local level and offer strong incentives for general performance improvements targeting areas of importance for enhanced resilience. The PBCRG can be seen as an earmarked cross-sectoral grant with conditions attached to the use of its funding for climate change adaptation beyond business as usual. Combined with regular grant allocations, PBCRGs enable 100 per-cent of the investments in climate-sensitive sectors to become climate resilient over time. They include a set of minimum conditions, performance measures and a menu of eligible investments.
Local Resilience Programme (LRP) focuses on the delivery of four outputs that will directly contribute to increasing local governments’ access to climate finance and building resilience to climate change:

• Output 1 – Awareness and capacities to respond to climate change adaptation at the local level are increased;
• Output 2 – CCA is mainstreamed into government’s planning and budgeting systems and investments are implemented in line with the PBCRG mechanism;
• Output 3 – The PBCRG system is effectively and sustainably established in participating countries and leads to an increased amount of CCA finance available to local government and local economy;
• Output 4 – The role of local authorities and of the PBCRGS in addressing climate change are increasingly recognized at international level, through outreach, learning and quality assurance.

The Programme operates in three distinct phases:

• Phase I: Piloting, consists of an initial scoping analysis, followed by testing in two to four local governments. As of December 2018, The Gambia, Lesotho, Tanzania and Tuvalu are in Phase I; Ghana, Lao PDR, Mali, Mozambique and Niger are preparing to enter Phase II.
• Phase II: Consolidating, takes place in 5-10 local governments in a country. It involves collecting lessons and demonstrating the mechanism’s effectiveness at a larger scale. As of December 2018, Bangladesh, Benin, Cambodia and Nepal are in Phase II.
• Phase III: Scaling-up, is full national roll-out of LoCAL based on the results of the previous phases and lessons learned. LoCAL is gradually extended to all local governments, with domestic or international climate finance, and becomes the national system for channeling adaptation finance to the local level. Bhutan is in Phase III, with budget support from the European Union; Cambodia has also begun Phase III preparations.

Since its global scale up in 2014, LoCAL has engaged 99 local governments in 14 countries representing over 6 million people. Between 2014 and 2018, it delivered close to USD 16.5 million, with grants and technical assistance to countries totaling USD 10.9 million. During the same period, 517 climate change adaptation interventions were finalized across 11 countries using grants, with another 77 under implementation or being planned.

UNCDF is seeking a Programme Analyst, Local Resilience Programme (LRP), P-2 to work as part of the Local Resilience Programme (LRP) Secretariat team, to contribute to the effective delivery of the Programme’s activities, working under the overall guidance of the LRP Global Programme Manager and direct supervision of the LoCAL Deputy Project Manager (Africa),

This position will be based in Accra, Ghana.

Duties and Responsibilities

Summary of key functions:

The Programme Analyst will have the following duties and responsibilities, as per details below;

• Programme Management (40%)
• Monitoring and Evaluation (40%)
• Knowledge Management (20%)

The Programme Analyst, LRP will help the LoCAL Deputy Project Manager, P4 in supporting the technical oversight of assigned LRP programme management activities, contribute to the development and implementation of LRP’s Strategic and Annual Workplans and development of LRP’s private investment pipeline, as well as will be responsible for effective monitoring, evaluation and knowledge management, in line with corporate standards.

The Programme Analyst, P2 LRP is expected to work in close collaboration with the LRP Project team & Secretariat, UNCDF headquarters and regional offices, country project teams and CO programme and operations clusters, government officials, private sector, non-government and civil society organizations.

Detailed Description of Job Roles and Responsibilities

1) Programme Management (40%)

• Contribute to the development and implementation of assigned LRP/LoCAL country programs and support them in the monitoring and evaluation of respective workplans, in close collaboration with UNCDF Country Teams, the LoCAL Programme Manager (Africa) and the LRP Project Secretariat (global);

• Contribute to the provision of technical assistance to assigned LRP country programs (ex. writing terms of reference, memoranda of understanding, letter of agreement, recruitment and management of consultants);

• Contribute to strengthening the quality of monitoring and evaluation systems of program developments and implementation (including preparation and monitoring of the annual work plan, participation in field missions, contribution to the preparation of annual reports), identify problems and issues to be addressed and propose corrective actions, and identify and track follow-up actions;

• Liaise with relevant parties and maintain close working relationship with key stakeholders at various levels by building linkages and networks;

• Support the implementation of the LoCAL/LRP methodology for private climate finance access for climate smart/resilient investments and development of the investment pipeline;

• Collect intelligence on technical and financial partners, identify opportunities for collaboration with key actors and support the development of partnerships for LoCAL globally and in assigned countries;

• Support the organisation of events, meetings, conferences, etc., including proposing agenda topics, identifying participants, preparation of documents and presentations, etc.

2) Monitoring and Evaluation (40%):

• Participate in the development and implementation of procedures and methodologies for the effective monitoring and evaluation of the LoCAL./LRP Programme, and codevelop and implement LRP/LoCAL’s M&E plan, based on LRP/LoCAL’s Theory of Change (ToC) and associated Results and Resources Framework (RRF);

• Contribute to strengthening LRP/LoCAL’s M&E system by providing inputs on LRP/LoCAL ToC and RRF, assessing relevance and pertinence of KPIs and M&E system and data collection/analysis tools, identifying and proposing improvements;

• Support the implementation of the LoCAL Board decision of establishing LoCAL as a standard and recognized country-based mechanism local climate finance in LDCs, including substantive support to the promotion and roll-out of the LoCAL ISO.

• Monitor and evaluate progress towards annual work plans, expected outputs, including selecting and monitoring progress in meeting indicators, and ensure timely and complete reporting from LRP/LoCAL country teams in accordance with approved reporting formats;

• Ensure an effective deployment and use of LRP/LoCAL Management Information System (MIS), conduct a review of existing MIS and procedures in place, identify bottlenecks and provide inputs on potential improvements and upgrading, as well as ensure information are constantly updated and available to country teams, the LRP Project Secretariat and relevant stakeholders;

• Coordinate and provide substantive inputs on the results-based management planning and reporting process, provide advice/information/guidance to LRP Project Secretariat on programme strategies, and coordinate reporting exercises quarterly, half-yearly and annually, in close collaboration with LRP country teams, the LRP Project Secretariat and relevant stakeholders;

• Provide ad-hoc assistance to LRP/LoCAL country teams across the available components of the programme to ensure effective implementation of M&E/MIS/KPIs, including assistance with the deployment of the Assessing Climate Change Adaptation Framework (ACCAF) in LRP/LoCAL countries;

• Assist in the coordination of evaluations (internal and external), including drafting Terms of Reference, liaising with regional/country offices and partners, and independent experts;

• Review and provide inputs on evaluation reports for quality control purposes according to international standards and in line with UNCDF’s Evaluation Policy and the UNEG Norms & Standards.

3) Knowledge Management (20%):

• Identify key knowledge constraints and organize learning, knowledge exchange, training, workshops, etc. to build awareness and capacities of LoCAL country teams in themes related to the implementation of LRP/LoCAL’s ToC, RRF and ACCAF;

• Support the redesign of the LRP/LoCAL training curricula, held annually at the Hague Academy, so that it becomes a certification of LRP/LoCAL consultants, pursuant to the abovementioned LoCAL Board Decision objectives;

• Participate in meetings, workshops and other discussion fora to establish a dialogue on evaluation results paying close attention to the different information needs of different audiences for evaluation;

• Prepare various written outputs, e.g. draft background papers, analyses, sections of reports and studies, inputs to publications, etc;

• Contribute to the implementation of the LRP/LoCAL’s Communication and Visibility Plan, in collaboration with the LRP Project Secretariat, partners and technical consultants;

• Assist in identifying, collecting and disseminating best practices and lesson learned from the Programme in areas of specialty.

IV. Impact of Results
The incumbent will contribute to the Local Resilience Programme (LRP)’s efforts of strengthening its programme management, monitoring and evaluation, data management and reporting systems with a view of generating improvements at both outcome and output levels.

Competencies

Core Compentencies

• Innovation: Ability to make new and useful ideas work;
• Leadership: Ability to persuade others to follow;
• People Management: Ability to improve performance and satisfaction;
• Communication: Ability to listen, adapt, persuade and transform;
• Delivery: Ability to get things done while exercising good judgement.

Technical/ Functional Competencies:
Subject Matter Expertise: Possesses expert knowledge of advanced concepts in to digital & financial inclusion, a broad knowledge of related disciplines, as well as an in-depth knowledge of relevant organizational policies and procedures.
Knowledge Management: Ability to capture, develop, share and effectively use information and knowledge.
Project Management: Ability to plan, organize, and control resources, procedures and protocols to achieve specific goals.
Relationship Management: Ability to engage and foster strategic partnerships with other parties, Inter-Agency Coordination and forge productive working relationships.
Results Based Programming: Assesses project performance to identify success factors and incorporates best practices into project work.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Master’s Degree or equivalent Advanced Degree preferably in International Relations, Environment, Business Administration, Economics or related field.

Experience:

• A minimum of two (2) years’ experience in program/project management, with a focus on M&E and RBM in development projects implemented by national and/or international institutions, NGOs, UN bodies, and/or Government is required;
• Experience in the design and implementation of M&E plans and tools. Knowledge and experience in setting up M&E systems for climate change adaptation programs/projects is highly desirable;
• Work experience with investment pipeline development, particularly with private sector is highly desirable;
• Familiarity with theory and practice of social science research methods from university studies or from applied experience is desirable;
• Hands-on experience in report writing and in preparing pieces of work for communications and partnership building purposes is desirable
• Demonstrable networking capabilities and ability to associate him/herself with a range of actors with a view to building relations and facilitating links is desirable;
• Work experience of and/or in Least Developed Countries LDCs is preferred;
• Experience in conducting training needs assessments and delivering capacity building is an asset;
• Experience with a UN organization/agency is desirable.

Language Requirements:

• Fluency in written and spoken English is required.
• Fluency/ knowledge of French language is considered desirable.

Tagged as: Ghana, Resilience