Back Food Security and Agricultural Livelihoods Assessment Specialist

Organizational Setting

FAO is a specialized Agency of the United Nations whose mission is to contribute to eradicating hunger and achieving food security for all. FAO provides high quality technical and policy expertise to its member countries, thus assisting them in their efforts to meet their goals for eradicating hunger, reducing poverty and fostering improvements in agricultural and rural livelihoods in a sustainable manner. 

In Myanmar, FAO supports rural livelihoods, farmers and vulnerable groups in collaboration with various stakeholders, development partners and public and private institutions. FAO Emergency program in Myanmar is working on: i) Rebuilding agriculture-based livelihoods through supply of agricultural, livestock and aquaculture inputs and cash transfer, training on good agriculture practices, climate smart agriculture, nutrition, hygiene and COVID-19 risk mitigation, provision land preparation harvesting equipment, improving animal health services; ii) Rehabilitating productive infrastructure and contribute to conservation through fishpond renovation and construction through cash-for-work and agricultural land rehabilitation; and iii) Improving disaster Risk Reduction, early warning and anticipatory action systems as well as community based disaster risk management. 

Reporting Lines
 
Under the general guidance of the FAO Representative to Myanmar, the operational management of the Emergency and Rehabilitation Coordinator in Myanmar, in consultation with Assistant FAOR (Program), the technical supervision of the needs assessments team of the Office of Emergencies and Resilience (OER) based in Rome, Italy, and the relevant technical support from the Regional Office for Asia Pacific (RAP), the incumbent shall specifically undertake the following tasks:

Technical Focus

As part of the Office of Emergencies and Resilience (OER), the Needs Assessment team is in charge of generating quality and timely evidence to inform decision-making and programming, including anticipatory action and emergency response. Under the Global Humanitarian Response Plan (GHRP), FAO, in close collaboration with key partners such as the World Food Programme, the global Food Security Cluster and the Global Network Against Food Crises, is establishing a global data and analysis facility to create a common understanding and inform programming. The information system relies principally on remotely collected data (mobile phone and on-line), collected either by FAO offices themselves or through international service providers. Field assessments may also be conducted at a later stage using data collection tools such as Kobo or Open Data Kit (ODK). 

The three main workstreams are:  

•    A dynamic monitoring system of agricultural livelihoods and food security in the context of various shocks, consisting of periodic household and non-household data collection (through phone and in-person surveys) and analysis; 
•    Ex-post assessments of the impacts of shocks on agricultural livelihoods and value chains, using phased methodological approaches such as remote-sensing, damage & loss analyses, Post-Disaster Needs Assessments (PDNA), and other food security & livelihood surveys.  
•    Risk profiles, which are derived from geographic baselines of past events and their impacts on agricultural livelihoods.  
•    The various outputs of these three streams are processed, visualized and disseminated through FAO’s Data in Emergencies hub.  

Tasks and responsibilities:

•    Coordinate with national stakeholders (UN Agencies, NGOs, food security cluster) involved in food security and livelihoods assessments or surveillance, and promote multi-actors’ initiatives; 
•    Contribute to the development of a country roadmap (or annual workplan) and regularly liaise with the country management team and the regional assessment advisor on the alignment of the roadmap with strategic, technical and operational requirements;  
•    Collect baseline and secondary data to enable comparisons and triangulation. Secondary data can refer to food prices monitoring, agricultural inputs prices monitoring, international trade figures, food security outcomes, containment measures, social protection measures, remote-sensing-based seasonal monitoring etc.;
•    Define survey objectives and areas of interest based on information gaps and programmatic needs;
•    Assist in the choice of data collection modalities (Computer-Assisted Telephone Interviews, web surveys, or face-to-face) and interfaces (international service provider, local partner, in-house call centre etc.);
•    Search for existing sampling frames and consolidate lists of respondents with phone numbers;
•    Assist in the adaptation of generic questionnaires to context-specific circumstances and objectives;
•    Contribute to the programming of questionnaires into the digital data collection systems (take the lead in case of Kobo);
•    Regularly liaise with the country management team and the regional assessment advisors on the progress of the survey exercise and the alignment with strategic, technical and operational requirements;
•    Develop training materials and participate to enumerator training sessions;
•    Conduct additional semi-structured interviews with key informants in order to dig for specific issues, as needed;
•    Contribute to the analysis and interpretation of collected data;
•    Discuss and validate the results with the global assessment team, regional offices and hubs, Global Information and Early Warning System (GIEWS) and any other relevant FAO units;
•    Lead data analysis (including weights, statistical analysis and qualitative analysis);  
•    Lead the exploration and interpretation of dashboards on the staging hub, including the formulation of highlights and operational recommendations, and facilitate their validation by a panel of internal experts before publication;  
•    Contribute to the production of various analytical products including reports, presentations, meta-analyses, and StoryMaps, using standard templates;  
•    Contribute to the dissemination of results and promotion of the Data in Emergencies hub. It can include hub demos and presentations of the survey findings to FAO country teams, donors or Food Security cluster partners;  
•    Help draft and review monitoring reports and visual products (e.g. dashboards), using standard templates;
•    Monitor the publication of studies and data produced by other stakeholders in the country;
•    Contribute to emergency response and programme design as requested;
•    Contribute to FAO corporate learning processes and documentation about assessments;
•    When required, contribute to advising and strengthening the capacity of relevant stakeholders and local surveillance systems;
•    Support data collection and needs assessment activities for other major crises or disasters occurring in supported countries;
•    Undertake travel, as necessary, and;
•    Perform any other related duties as requested. 

CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING

Minimum Requirements

•    University degree in agronomy, rural statistics, agricultural economics, relevant social or natural sciences, or other related discipline relevant to the mandate of the Organization. Advanced or higher degree preferred; 
•    Minimum of 5 years of proven knowledge and experience in assessments, surveillance systems, or monitoring and evaluation in the context of emergencies and food crises; 
•    Good working knowledge of English, 
•    Myanmar National.

FAO Core Competencies 

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

Technical/Functional Skills 

•    Ability to work under pressure and adapt to an evolving and complex humanitarian context and within multidisciplinary and different cultural background teams; 
•    Strong analytical skills and knowledge of agriculture, food security, livelihoods and value chains in the context of Myanmar;
•    Experience or familiarity with food security and livelihoods assessments methodologies, including surveillance or monitoring systems, Post-Disaster Needs Assessments, Damage and Losses assessments, agricultural production assessment, market analysis, and/or value chain analysis; 
•    Experience in survey design, sampling, data collection, data analysis, and interpretation for assessment processes in agriculture and food security; 
•    Expertise in remote data collection including phone or web-based surveys and/or remote-sensing would be a plus; 
•    Working knowledge of advanced statistics with ability to use statistical software packages (in particular SPSS , STATA and/or  R);
•    Experience in using and programming questionnaires in digital data collection tools (Kobo toolbox, ODK);
•    Proven data visualization and reporting skills; 
•    Excellent communication skills, both verbal and written; 
•    Coordination skills with strong individual planning capacity; 
•    Knowledge of humanitarian principles. 

Selection Criteria

•    Relevant analytical knowledge of the agriculture sector, food security and livelihoods;
•    Extended working experience on food security and livelihoods assessments, and good; understanding of agriculture value chain; 
•    Expertise in survey design, sampling, data collection, data analysis, and interpretation for assessment processes in agriculture and food security; 
•    Willingness and ability to travel to remote, rural locations, Team player;
•    Good communication, analytical and writing skills.
 

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION