Switzerland: Senior Officer, Hunger Resilience

Organizational context

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) is the world's largest humanitarian organization, with 190 member National Societies. As part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, our work is guided by seven fundamental principles; humanity, impartiality, neutrality, independence, voluntary service, unity and universality.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC or “the Federation”) is the world’s largest volunteer-based humanitarian network. The Federation is a membership organisation established by and comprised of its member National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Along with National Societies and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the Federation is part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. The overall aim of the IFRC is “to inspire, encourage, facilitate, and promote at all times all forms of humanitarian activities by National Societies with a view to preventing and alleviating human suffering and thereby contributing to the maintenance and promotion of human dignity and peace in the world.” It works to meet the needs and improve the lives of vulnerable people before, during and after disasters, health emergencies and other crises. The Federation is served by a Secretariat based in Geneva, with regional and country offices throughout the world. The Secretariat is led by the IFRC Secretary General and provides the central capacity of the International Federation to serve, connect, and represent National Societies. The Secretariat’s focus includes providing support to the IFRC governance mechanisms; setting norms and standards; providing guidance; ensuring consistency, coordination, and accountability for performance; knowledge sharing; promoting collaboration within and respect for the RCRC Movement; and expanding engagement with partners. The Secretariat’s headquarters is organized in three main business groups: (i) Partnerships, including Movement and Membership; (ii) Programmes and Operations; and (iii) Management Services. The Programme & Operations Division is in turn organised in three Departments, each of them led by a Director. The department of Disaster & Crisis Prevention Response & Recovery (DCPRR) consists of two teams, of which Programmes, Operations and Global Networks (POGN) is one. Within the POGN team the Senior Officer, Hunger Resilience as part of the risk and vulnerability thematic function works closely with other functions including response, recovery and preparedness, shelter and migration, as well as with other divisional teams including health, water and sanitation, and logistics, to ensure a collaborative approach to agreeing emergency operation strategies with regional and country counterparts, operational quality and accountability, institutional and hazard risk mapping and analysis, and the strategic use of the IFRC global disaster response tools.

Job Purpose

Under the supervision of the Risk and Vulnerability Lead the Senior Officer is be the overall IFRC focal point on food security, livelihood and nutrition. The Senior Officer supports the IFRC network to ensure high quality, coherent and well-coordinated vulnerability tracking, monitoring, risk and capacity mapping and profiling on hunger resilience. The Senior Officer will work in close cooperation with thematic functions in the DCPRR Department, regions, relevant networks and the IFRC Reference Centres. The Senior Officer will contribute to thought leadership and knowledge sharing across relevant technical areas, and support global representation and policy positioning as required.

Job Duties and Responsibilities

Provide support instrengthening risk and vulnerability coordination and management:

• Provide thought leadership, innovation and strategic direction in hunger resilience programming;
• Support the mobilisation of programme resources.
• Ensure quality and accountability in hunger resilience practice.
• Promote and support innovation and knowledge management in approaches to hunger resilience programming.
• Support hunger resilience as a component of resilience programming within National Societies and the Secretariat.

Support hunger resilience programmes and operations:

• Act as technical lead and support on hunger resilience programming, in close collaboration with National Societies, regions, ICRC, the Livelihood Resource Centre, Health Department, and key external partners.
• Act as focal point for inter-agency coordination and representation on food security and nutrition.
• Scale up IFRC’s food security and nutrition programming, including partnerships with institutions including FAO, WFP, IFPRI, IFOAM, UNICEF and NGOs.
• Act as the technical focal point for the implementation of global agreements on food security and nutrition with external partners
• Monitor the IFRC’s Food Security and Nutrition policy of 2003.

Support representation and information management across the global food security and hunger resilience network:

• Network and coordinate with Red Cross Red Crescent Movement partners, governments, NGOs, UN agencies, private sector and others.
• Represent the Federation Secretariat on risk and vulnerability related issues in internal and external fora and establish effective working relationships with key organizations and institutions.
• Provide regular information updates and briefings as required on risk and vulnerability trends, innovations and emerging best practices.
• Act as the IFRC focal point for the Global Nutrition Cluster in close collaboration with Health Department.
• Act as the IFRC focal point for the Global Food Security Cluster.
• Act as the IFRC technical focal person for the IFRC Livelihood Resource Centre and regional RC/RC networks.

Ensure quality assurance and accountability in operations:

• Act as the IFRC technical focal point to mainstream hunger resilience across the continuum and in all areas of focus.
• Ensure that relevant resilience tools are regularly updated and aligned with tools specific to each area of focus, and work closely with Nation Societies, regions and relevant thematic functions to define gaps and needs for additional guidance.
• Map the practices, capacities and needs of NS in hunger resilience, and support the regions to update or develop the required tools, working modalities or capacity building strategies.
• Promote and engage in relevant research and systematic monitoring and evaluation of all programmes and operations and ensure the integration of cross-cutting issues prioritized by the Movement.

Be responsible and accountable for the overall management and administration of related projects:

• Provide financial management, monitoring and coordination of project activities, and the delivery to time, budget and agreed quality standards of project outputs with related reporting and representation.
• Ensure the integrity of financial and administrative procedures and the consistent application of IFRC rules and procedures related to project activities.
• Contribute to the overall planning, budgeting and reporting of the team and the department.

Contribute to an effective, high quality IFRC team:

• Provide progress reports on results against objectives and risk analyses as required.
• Accommodate flexible working practices including working as part of time-limited, task-oriented teams to enable the IFRC to respond to new scenarios, operational needs or requests from Governance or the wider membership.
• Contribute to a client-oriented approach that values proactivity, continuous improvement, innovation, high performance and cost effectiveness.
• Foster a collaborative working environment with colleagues in the Secretariat, Regions, National Societies and external partners.
• Be available to deploy to Regions, Country Offices, or Operations to provide support as necessary.

Interested candidates are invited to apply via the following link:

http://www.ifrc.org/en/who-we-are/working-with-us/current-vacancies/job-description/?id=3161