Organizational Setting

The main objective of the FAO Country Office which is led by the FAO Representative is to assist governments and partners in developing policies, programs, and projects whose main objectives are to ensure food security and reduce hunger and malnutrition, to help develop agriculture, fisheries, and forestry including the use of their environmental and natural resources in a sustainable manner. The FAO office is also committed to implementing field projects and programs to implement the policies, strategies and action plan mentioned above. The country office has an important role on support to the country and partners in increasing the resilience of livelihoods to food and agriculture threats and crises exacerbated by climate change vulnerabilities.

In 2022 and due to severe drought that was declared a national disaster by the presidency in 2021 and which followed the desert locust invasion, the FAO representative established a unit that will coordinate emergencies in the country which will ensure preparedness (including anticipatory actions) and response to these emergencies are centrally planned and executed under the office of the FAO representative in Kenya.
The position is located in the FAO Representation in Kenya.

Reporting Lines

Under the overall supervision of the FAO Representative in Kenya, the Coordinator will be under direct supervision of the Assistant FAO Representative while still working closely with the co-leads of the Resilience food and Livelihood Systems sub-programme and other sub-programme leads.

Technical Focus

The coordinator will provide leadership for the advancement and implementation of emergency preparedness and response including the promotion of preventive and anticipatory actions. The Emergency preparedness and Coordination will ensure timely, coherent and coordinated action to foster the most effective response on the part of the organisation related to all emergency phases, from disaster prevention and early warning, through impact assessment, needs identification and relief intervention, to post-disaster rehabilitation and recovery.

Tasks and responsibilities

•    Provide leadership and vision for the advancement and implementation of emergency preparedness and responses
•    Management of the emergency projects
•    Coordinate implementation of projects in the field supported by FAO field officers and experts based in the Nairobi office.
•    Strengthening of the Early Warning Systems for effective mitigation measures.
•    Engage with traditional and new resource partners to secure funding for the implementation of emergency projects and interventions.
•    Ensure emergency interventions are adequately coordinated and contribute to relevant corporate programmes and initiatives.
•    Align emergency projects to FAO corporate priorities and the 4 betters while ensuring they fully contribute to the Country Programming Framework (CPF) and the UNSDF.
•    Continuously engage with National government on all matters of the emergency including providing information on FAOs interventions of the emergency.
•    Regularly update the management on the progress of emergency intervention including ongoing resource mobilization.
•    Support and provide technical inputs on resource mobilization within the RFLS sub programme for resilience building within the context of ending drought emergencies and including long term resilience building programmes/projects.
•    Link emergency and climate change adaptation aimed at reduction climate change risks.
•    Capacity building of staff of the National and County governments including service providers on technical subject matters that aid emergency response (LEGS, AMR, Conflict sensitive programming during emergency response)
•    Keeping the EPRU team informed of new trends in emergency preparedness and response including their involvement in resource mobilization proposal.
•    Support lessons learnt workshops and after-action reviews where recovery strategies are part of the outputs for resource mobilization.
•    Represent the FAOR in UN inter-sector Emergency meetings led by UNOCHA and support FAOR emergency meetings chaired by the Resident coordinator.
•    Perform other related duties and activities upon instructions received from the FAOR or their duly appointed representative.

CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING

Minimum Requirements  

•    Advanced university degree in Agricultural or development economics, disaster risk management, project planning & management, social science, or any other field related to the work of the Organization.
•    10 years of relevant work experience with over 5 years of experience in managing projects within the humanitarian context.
•    10 years or above of leadership within government structures
•    Working knowledge of English and Kiswahili
•    National of Kenya

FAO Core Competencies

•    Results Focus
•    Teamwork
•    Communication
•    Building Effective Relationships
•    Knowledge Sharing and Continuous Improvement

Technical/Functional Skills 

•    Work experience in more than one location or area of work
•    Good understanding of the drivers of drought and other emergencies like e-nino and desert locust invasions
•    Good understanding and experience working on drought and floods emergencies.
•    Demonstrable skills in project proposal development including log frame and budgeting
•    Ability to convince donors on why they should support FAO especially during emergencies.
•    Good understanding of anticipatory actions under forecasted emergencies
•    Good understanding of the development of UN -OCHA led emergency response plans (DRP) and development of Life saving CERF projects during emergencies and the related bidding strategies.
•    Ability to develop technical specifications of diverse livelihood response inputs like animal health vaccines, feed supplements, tools, and equipment to support interventions including water interventions.
•    Experience developing and management service provider contracts such as Letters of Agreements (LOAs)
•    Other skills relevant to the position

Selection Criteria 

•    Understanding of FAO Emergency preparedness and response model.
•    Understanding of the various tools used by FAO for forecasting drought and other emergencies
•    Understanding of FAO CPF priorities and relationship to UNSDF
•    Understanding of Government structure and how FAO relates to them.
•    Ability to build relationships with partners including UN agencies and national and county governments to ensure FAOs visibility that ensures FAO’s name is respected and embraced as the Go to UN humanitarian agency and food and nutrition security experts

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION