Openings at UNICEF

How can you make a difference?

Coordinate and provide technical support to COs for Health Financing

• Oversee regional office technical support to UNICEF Country Offices (COs) for the costing of their PHC packages and advocacy to increase domestic funding for PHC
• Support UNICEF COs to prepare, present and summarize PHC financing findings for advocacy and use at country, regional and global levels.
• Support technically UNICEF COs in the region to develop the relevant economic analyses aligning with their national context, including focus on equity and decentralized financial flows and absorption
• Provide technical guidance on Public Financial Management for Health
• Follow up and provide support to countries in operationalizing action plans that emerged from the Regional Health Finance Forum 2023 for improvement in policies or reforms for increased PHC Financing

Develop materials and guidance documents for economic analyses for health

• Develop package of guidance, tools, terms of reference for defining and estimating the costs of PHC packages, measuring PHC progress and financing, ensuring alignment with UNICEF and WHO joint global guidance and comparability across countries/regions
• Contribute to cross-country analyses of findings in support of global-level comparisons and documentation of promising practices, including around sustainability of financing for digital health
• Develop generic materials and methodologies to support health financing-related requests from COs (including UHC, investment cases, community health, health insurance, costing, etc.)
• Maintain roster of Health Economists that can provide in country technical assistance, throughout the region
• Disseminate the latest scientific knowledge and country experiences in developing, implementing, and advancing health financing policy for PHC.
• Develop content and organize capacity building webinars and course material targeted to different audiences within UNICEF (senior management, chiefs, health specialists)

Strengthen health financing partnerships at regional level

• Engage actively with existing mechanisms (such as HHA), regional level UN entities, public and private sector partners, to advance health financing best practices
• Advocate, during strategic discussions with Ministries of Finance and Health and other key decision makers and stakeholders, including UNICEF COs, to influence agenda setting in favor of health and wellbeing of children, women and young people
• Collaborate with WHO, BMGF, World Bank/GFF, USAID and other UN agencies and implementing partners to support country-level technical assistance on public financing: costing, financial and fiscal space analysis, budgeting and design of financing mechanisms to benefit children and women.
• Collaborate with systems strengthening experts in Health, HIV, Supply, Nutrition, ECD and other sections to ensure an optimal integration and alignment of the PHC Health Finance work with other ongoing initiatives.

Contribute to health systems’ strengthening agenda within UNICEF Regional Office

• Provide technical assistance to countries in the region on PHC integration of services and delivery, including Kenya (BMFG Joint Investment Mechanism Grant). Oversee grant reporting, budgeting, and provide technical oversight from regional office.
• Participate in regular weekly HSS meetings, Health section quarterly reviews, and region wide activities (e.g. country office annual reviews and regional office planning).
• Represent UNICEF ESARO in Health Harmonization for Africa (HHA) HSS partnership meetings and technical working group disucssions.
• Collaborate with systems strengthening experts in Health, HIV, Supply, Nutrition, ECD and other sections to ensure an optimal integration and alignment of the PHC and PHC Health Finance work with other ongoing initiatives.
• Perform other relevant HSS interventions in coordination with the supervisor

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in health economics or public health with a focus on health economics or health financing, or an advanced degree in economics or financing with a focus on Health Systems Strengthening and/or another related field is required.
• A good knowledge of theoretical and practical modeling is required
• Prior experience developing costing /using costing tools (OneHealth Tool, CHPCT, EQUIST)
• A minimum of 8 (eight) years of experience at the national and international levels in a relevant discipline, such as international public health or global development is required.
• Prior experience working with UNICEF country offices in Africa is required particularly in areas of economic analysis
• Preference will be given to candidates who have:
  • Knowledge and experience of health economic analysis, especially cost analysis
  • Knowledge of and experience with Public Financial Management in Health
  • Knowledge of analyses of global health financing issues and trends
  • Strong communication and relationship building skills in both the national community (e.g. local universities, national research institutions) and the global health community, particularly among donors, multilateral partners, and implementers
  • Experience with Health Systems Strengthening applications and programs
  • Experience in strengthening public health financing and governance
  • Developing country work experience and/or familiarity with emergencies is considered an asset.
  • Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.

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How can you make a difference?

The Emergency Specialist will provide support to Level 3 (L3) Corporate Emergency Activation procedure (CEAP) Scale-up for the Horn of Africa drought crisis presents an increasing need to mobilize dedicated support to the drought-affected countries of Somalia, Kenya, and Ethiopia, and Great Lakes countries (Rwanda, Tanzania, Burundi, and Uganda).

Technical Support To COs For Humanitarian Planning/HACs, Preparedness Planning

• Provide technical reviews and recommendations to Country office HAC plans and Country Programme Documents
• Support in the development of preparedness planning and update of EPP and data readiness.

Support regional management for L2 and L3 EMTs

• Contribute to monthly updates and analysis of results[DM1]
• Support L3 country offices with advocacy and resource mobilization activities through monthly or quarterly dissemination of call to action
• Plan and organize all Technical Emergency Team meetings
• Liaise with EMOPS to ensure support for all COs and ensure smooth two-way flow of information and analysis
• Provide technical support on core cross cutting and programmatic support to country offices in crisis

Quality assurance and strengthened capacity building for humanitarian reporting in the region:

• Support capacity building for Country Offices for EPR through development and delivering of country-specific and multi-country remote and onsite support to share good practice for
  • Reporting and knowledge management in humanitarian settings.
  • Regional donor reporting requirements for humanitarian funding.
• Draft and edit donor reports for the section and HARP contributions to ESARO regional reports.
• Support the preparation, documentation, reporting and follow-up of the emergency team meetings within the RO, including Emergency Management Team, Humanitarian Action Group, Humanitarian Network Meeting, and weekly section meetings.
• Support in the review of HAC narrative, HPM/IM dashboards and other documents in terms of coherence, editing and clarity in general.

Improved knowledge management and section planning for HARP

• Oversee knowledge management for the section and provide support to COs as needed.
• Support analysis and information sharing on humanitarian action by consolidating information on various humanitarian contexts, priority humanitarian needs, UNICEF and partners’ ongoing response and priority resource needs and support the development and editing of communications products for internal and external dissemination.
• Support the preparation of regional office work planning exercises, mid-year review, and end-of-year review reporting.

Enhanced support for the UNICEF/UNHCR collaborative relationship

• Support the collaborative work with UNHCR, including ESARO’s Collaboration Framework, and particularly for Ethiopia CO and Rwanda CO as part of the Blueprint Initiative.
• Support on the operationalization and roll-out of the new Collaboration framework in the region

Enhanced advocacy and research support provided to the Emergency Specialists

• Co-leads on the Great Lakes and Horn of Africa region with a focus on country office support, development of relevant documents that include briefing notes, talking points, research, and presentations for high-level meetings.

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…

Education

• Advanced university degree (or equivalent) in the areas of policy, social sciences, development, international affairs, communications.

Experience

• Five years professional work experience at national and international levels in humanitarian response.
• Preferred experience in preparedness, complex emergencies, including experience in early recovery in the East and Southern Africa region.
• Experience in: Reporting, communications and advocacy in humanitarian/emergency issues or contexts; Developing and managing Knowledge Management platforms; Developing and presenting trainings.
• Excellent organization skills, attention to detail; written and oral communication skills
• Ability to work independently and respond to feedback in a timely and professional manner
• Experience in report writing and communications within the UN common system highly desirable.

Language Requirements

• Fluency in both written and spoken English, knowledge of another UN language is a strong asset.