Food Systems and Nutrition Analyst

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WHY JOIN WFP? 

• WFP is a 2020 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate.

• WFP offers a highly inclusive, diverse, and multicultural working environment.

• WFP invests in the personal & professional development of its employees through a range of training, accreditation, coaching, mentorship, and other programs as well as through internal mobility opportunities.

• A career path in WFP provides an exciting opportunity to work across the various country, regional and global offices around the world, and with passionate colleagues who work tirelessly to ensure that effective humanitarian assistance reaches millions of people across the globe.

• We offer an attractive compensation package (please refer to the Terms and Conditions section of this vacancy announcement).

JOB TITLE:     Food Systems and Nutrition Analyst
TYPE OF CONTRACT:    Regular Consultant
UNIT/DIVISION:    Nutrition and Food Quality Service (PPGN), Programme, Policy & Guidance Division 
 DUTY STATION (City, Country):    Rome, Italy
DURATION:    11 months

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNMENT:
Nutrition and Food Quality Service leads WFP's efforts towards achieving Sustainable Development Goal target 2.2: ending all forms of malnutrition by 2030. This is an ambitious goal as malnutrition remains a universal and enormous global challenge, with significant health and economic consequences to individuals, communities and entire countries. WFP is therefore advancing its efforts to both prevent and treat malnutrition and has developed a situational assessment to support decision-making for the prevention of all forms of malnutrition: Fill the Nutrient Gap (FNG).

Improved nutrition situation analysis can increase the understanding of the likely magnitude and main causes of the nutrient gap among a particular target group, e.g. children aged 6-23 months or pregnant and breastfeeding women and girls, in a specific context. It can also inform where transformative change needs to happen in the food system to improve diets. The FNG analysis is based on a better and more in-depth analysis of existing nutrition, dietary intake, food security, food prices, household food expenditure and socio-economic data. Starting in 2015, WFP, with technical input from key research institutes (University of California Davis, IFPRI, Epicentre, Mahidol, Harvard) and Save the Children and UNICEF, developed the FNG assessment, which aims to strengthen analysis, build consensus and support decision-making for improving nutrient intake and preventing malnutrition, including during the critical period of the first 1,000 days. 

The FNG uses nutrition modelling (enhanced cost of diet analysis) combined with a review of secondary data on food systems, local dietary practices and malnutrition to identify options that enable people to access and choose a more nutritious diet. The analysis is designed to contribute to national policy and programming planning cycles by highlighting potential entry points for nutrition-related action by different sectors and actors. Key stakeholders are engaged throughout the process as needed, particularly in analysis and utilization of the findings, to facilitate multi-stakeholder discussions on the identification of context-specific policy and programme options and prioritisation of actions.  

The FNG process and the data analysis are facilitated, and in parts led, by the Systems Analysis for Nutrition team under the Learning and Innovation unit at WFP Headquarters, in collaboration with WFP Country Offices and Regional Offices.

By 2025, the FNG assessment's concept and methods are well established, and the analysis has been conducted in more than 50 countries, including in fragile settings. WFP is working closely with World Bank, IFPRI, UC Davis, Johns Hopkins Centre for a Liveable Future, Tilburg University, Capgemini and others on further developments of the FNG including capacity strengthening, costing of options and aligning FNG with other initiatives such as estimating the cost of a healthy diet, assessing environmental impact of diets as well as impact of climate change on diets, and characterizing sub-national food environments using market-based food price data collection.

The consultant will continue her role on the Systems Analysis for Nutrition team to provide technical assistance to countries to undertake FNG analyses and to further strengthen the analytical toolbox including development, testing, and rollout of the Enhance platform. 
ACCOUNTABILITIES/RESPONSIBILITIES:
1)    FNG analysis and nutrition analytics
1)    Co-lead and support FNG processes including data analysis, secondary analysis, report writing, stakeholder engagement; and provide support to WFP colleagues at COs and ROs throughout the process.
2)    Prepare data, set up models and carry out quantitative modelling of cost and affordability of nutritious diets and nutrition-specific and -sensitive interventions using the Enhance analytical platform and relevant statistical tools such as R, Stata, and Excel 
3)    Support the identification, review and analysis of secondary data sources relevant to nutrition, dietary intake, food security, food prices, household income/food expenditure and socio-economic indicators.
4)    Support trainings of enumerators for primary data collection of food prices as needed.
5)    Coordinate with WFP Regional Offices and key stakeholders, to support the FNG design and analysis, including affordability analysis, the cost of healthy and nutritious diets, and intervention modelling.
6)    Support WFP Country Offices in technical discussions with key government counterparts and other stakeholders with regard to the FNG analysis. 
7)    Support WFP Country Offices and key national stakeholders to identify intervention modelling options of different types of strategies, transfers and delivery modalities.
8)    Facilitate and contribute to country meetings for FNG inception, validation of findings with stakeholders, dissemination and formulation of recommendations by stakeholders as required.
9)    Support WFP Country Offices in the development of advocacy materials with key messages derived from the FNG analysis and the recommendation of context-specific strategies to fill nutrient gaps in key target groups.
10)    Development of deliverables including slide deck of main findings and the write-up of the FNG findings in the summary and the report.
11)    Support the write up of topic briefs and additional nutrition analytics upon demand.

2)    Contribute to strengthen the application and dissemination of the nutrition analytics
1)    Support updates to the FNG and nutrition analytics toolbox, as required, and based on WFP Nutrition Strategy and evolving programme priorities.
2)    Support the conceptualization and development of articles, presentations, webinars, learning and training materials on FNG and nutrition analytic, as required. 
3)    Represent WFP in international conferences, meetings and other events in relation to FNG and nutrition analytics, as required.
Support capacity strengthening of nutrition analytics, including on the testing and development of guidance on Enhance, and training for WFP regional and country offices and national stakeholders on the platform.  
DELIVERABLES AT THE END OF THE CONTRACT:
Related to FNG analyses

•    Full final report, summary, and slide deck for each FNG country the consultant worked on, which may include Madagascar, Iraq, and others as needed

•    If required, ad hoc thematic papers or other publications on results of FNG and other nutrition analytics. 

•    Draft advocacy material summarizing the key messages derived from the FNG and nutrition analytics, to be used by WFP Country Offices and Regional Offices to inform their programming and for further policy discussions with their government counterparts. 

Related to thought leadership on systems analysis for nutrition 

•    Relevant input to the development and strengthening of analytical tools as needed.

•    Peer reviewed articles, reports and contributions submitted for publication as applicable.

•    Presentations in international conferences, fora, technical meetings as needed.

•    Collaboration with WFP colleagues on nutrition integration, particularly by providing analytical inputs and identifying entry points across sectors and programming platforms.

•    Strengthened collaboration with WFP offices and key partner organisations, including capacity strengthening.

QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE REQUIRED:

Education:    Graduate level (Masters or above) in Public Health (Epidemiology or biostatistics), Nutrition, Economics (or Econometrics), Sustainable food systems, Agronomy, Statistics or other socio-economic disciplines with a strong quantitative data analysis component. 

Experience:    
•    Between 3-5 years of relevant professional experience, including research and data analysis

•    Experience with dietary assessment, linear programming-based tools such as Enhance, Optifood or other Nutrition Modelling tools, GIS and/or mapping software.

•    Previous experience of working in low and middle-income countries, experience in fragile contexts considered an asset.

Knowledge
and Skills:    
•    Proficient in conducting quantitative and qualitative data analysis based on secondary data required

•    Ability to use statistical software packages such as R, STATA or others.

•    Solid knowledge of nutrition and food systems required.

•    Knowledge of different types of programmes such as social protection, health, school feeding, livelihoods and resilience and emergency programmes is considered an asset. 

•    Good interpersonal skills and understanding of multicultural settings, including of different stakeholders (government, NGOs, academia, others).

•    Capacity building and facilitation skills appreciated.

•    Ability to work independently in a timely and organised manner and as part of a multidisciplinary team.

•    Excellent written and oral communication skills required.

•    Flexibility in thinking and ability to adapt to different situations quickly and with ease.
Language    
•    Professional level of written and spoken English, Arabic and French, and aptitude to writing different types of communications. 

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REASONABLE ACCOMMODATION

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