Description
Working at the World Bank Group provides a unique opportunity for you to help our clients solve their greatest development challenges. The World Bank Group is one of the largest sources of funding and knowledge for developing countries; a unique global partnership of five institutions dedicated to ending extreme poverty, increasing shared prosperity and promoting sustainable development. With 189 member countries and more than 120 offices worldwide, we work with public and private sector partners, investing in groundbreaking projects and using data, research, and technology to develop solutions to the most urgent global challenges. For more information, visit www.worldbank.org
Human Development/People Practice Group (HD PG) in Western and Central Africa
The World Bank Group (WBG) is the largest provider of development finance and solutions for human development working with high-income, middle-income, and low-income countries to develop country-tailored solutions for human development (HD) under the themes of education, health, social protection and jobs and gender. The HD PG coordinates with other Practice Groups to ensure a coordinated and integrated approach to development challenges, and through the World Bank Regional Units is expected to deliver the strongest and most pertinent support to our client countries.
Home to about half a billion people, Western and Central Africa (AFW) encompasses 22 countries stretching from the westernmost point of Africa across the equator and partly along the Atlantic Ocean to the Republic of Congo in the South. The sub-region is rich in resources, yet its vast opportunities are tempered by persistent gaps and inequalities in poverty reduction, social protection, and jobs, which have Africa only reaching forty percent of its estimated human capital potential. Moreover, conflict, food insecurity, population growth, and climate change threaten to curtail or even reverse the progress that has been made over the past decades. The COVID-19 pandemic and the current macro and fiscal environment has brought back to the forefront the risks posed by weak social protection systems with limited coverage, but also shown the large potential that strong systems have to support the lives and livelihoods of the poor and vulnerable when a crisis hits. health systems and poor surveillance.
AFW’s Regional Strategy aims to sustainably reduce poverty and increase shared prosperity in AFW countries through growth and economic transformation to create better jobs for more people, including women and youth. AFW is focusing on contributing to the realization of four high-level goals to achieve this transformation:
• Rebuild trust between citizens and the state
• Remove the bottlenecks that prevent firms from creating more and better jobs
• Strengthen human capital and empower women
• Ramp up climate resilience
Human Development will play a central role in helping client countries achieve these goals. The HD Practice Group has a large and growing portfolio in West and Central Africa, which includes long-standing engagements supporting governments to strengthen their social protection programs and delivery systems as well as promoting innovations around (climate-) adaptive social protection, jobs, education, skills, health and other human capital investments.
Human Development in Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone has made commendable strides in improving human capital development with the government demonstrating a strong commitment to enhancing the well-being and productivity of its population through investments in health, education and social protection. The new Sierra Leone’s Medium-term National Development Plan (2024-2030) prioritizes human capital development among its five key pillars. Since 2005 there have been significant improvements in under-5 mortality rates, adult survival rates, and under-5 stunting prevalence.
However, Sierra Leone still lags behind some of its regional counterparts in human capital development and ranks 165 out of 174 countries in the 2020 Human Capital Index (HCI). The country’s HCI score was 0.36 in 2020, indicating that a child born in Sierra Leone will only be 36 percent as productive when they grow up as they would have been with complete education and full health. This is below the average for Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and low-income countries. Therefore, Sierra Leone must safeguard its human capital gains, as deficits in the health and education sectors could hinder the productivity of the next generation of workers. Additionally, supporting the poor and vulnerable is a fundamental requirement of implementing the ‘leave no one behind’ principle in the fragile context of Sierra Leone where more than half of inhabitants live below the poverty line and nearly 1 million of whom are extremely poor.
Social Protection & Jobs Global Practice (HAWS3)
The Social Protection and Jobs (SPJ) Global Practice plays a central role in the World Bank’s support to the Government of Sierra Leone in its efforts to address economic and development challenges and to foster stronger growth and development. The current SPJ portfolio contains large investments across both operations and analytics, including the Productive Social Safety Nets and Youth Employment Project and strategic research activities on SPJ systems, adaptive social protection, gender, jobs and skills. Across its work program, the SPJ works closely with other global practices, especially Education and Health, Nutrition and Population, under the overall guidance of the Country Management Unit (CMU) and plays a leadership role in the Bank’s work on human capital.
Education Global Practice (HAWE3)
The Education GP team works with client countries to address low quality at all levels of education, increasing the efficiency and accountability of education services, modernizing the higher end of the formal education continuum, integrating science and technology more effectively, and aligning skills formation with the needs of a fast-growing Region. The Education GP aims to not only deliver high quality products but also to build capacity in client countries through collaborative interactions with country counterparts and other development partners. It seeks to bring the best possible knowledge to bear on the practical challenges facing client countries and at the same time places a high priority on knowledge generation, including through rigorous impact evaluations of education interventions.
In Sierra Leone, the Bank has a growing program. Ongoing and recently concluded education operations in Sierra Leone include the: (i) Free Education Project (US$50 million International Development Association [IDA] grant and multi-donor trust fund grant of US$16 million from DFID, EU and Irish Aid, and additional financing COVID-19 grant of US$6.85 million from Global Partnership for Education [GPE]). The project aims to enhance equitable access to education, improve learning outcomes and skills acquisition, and strengthen education system; and (ii) Skills Development Project (US$20 million), which aims to be the platform to develop a demand-led skills development system by providing competitive grants to TVET institutions and private sectors. The project closed in June 2024.
The World Bank is also active in knowledge generation on key issues in the education sector in Sierra Leone and contributes relevant analysis and inputs to cross-sectoral reports and strategic documents. These include, but are not limited to, a three country ASA with a focus on strengthening skills development in Sierra Leone, and an Adolescent Girls Education Empowerment ASA which focus on Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
Health, Nutrition and Population (HNP) Global Practice Context
The HNP Global Practice includes staff members in Washington, DC and many country offices, who work with and across multiple sectors in recognition of the fact that HNP outcomes often depend on actions that lie outside the sector. The HNP Global Practice supports country and regional efforts to: (i) improve health outcomes, especially for the poor and most vulnerable; (ii) expand access to high-quality HNP services, interventions and technologies that give the most value for money; (iii) strengthen health systems for results; (iv) establish and improve health financing mechanisms that promote efficiency, equity and sustainability of investments; (v) strengthen health-relevant institutions within and outside the health sector; (vi) harness multisectoral policies and investments for better health outcomes; (vii) empower adolescent girls and women; (viii) strengthen health emergency prevention, preparedness, and response; and (ix) develop and learn from rigorous impact evaluations.
Duties and Accountabilities
As an integral member of the Sierra Leone Human Development task team, the human development specialist is expected to make substantial contributions to program development and delivery in Sierra Leone. S/he will report to the SPJ Practice Manager and her/his work program will be cross-sectoral between SPJ, Education and Health, Nutrition and Population. Across these three Human Development sectors, s/he will support task team leaders and team members to build on the longstanding engagement with the client, while helping ensure the timely delivery of services. The primary areas of contribution will be: (i) policy dialogue with the client; (ii) identification, preparation, and supervision of lending operations; (iii) technical assistance and research; and (iv) engagement and coordination with a range of development partners.
In particular, as the World Bank intensifies its support to the Government of Sierra Leone in these three sectors to ensure recovery and resilience from the various crises, the human development specialist will be responsible for the following tasks:
• Provide technical, advisory and supervisory support to key project implementing agencies and partners, among others the Ministry of Basic Education, Ministry of Tertiary Education, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Labor and Social Security, Ministry of Youth Affairs, Anti-Corruption Commission, the National Youth Commission, Local Councils and Municipalities and the National Commission for Social Action to help ensure successful implementation of projects in Social Protection, Education and Health.
• Lead and/or support key components of the Productive Social Safety Nets and Youth Employment (PSSNYE) Project;
• Lead and/or support on advisory services and analytical works on the social protection and jobs agenda, among others, adaptive social protection, economic inclusion, supporting female labor market participation, food and nutrition security;
• Support engagement and coordination with other partners – donors, NGOs, civil society – operating in the areas relevant for engagements in SPJ, education and health.
• Support policy dialogue and implementation support of the Free Education Project;
• Support follow up actions on education from the Sierra Leone’s Human Capital Review, including a strategic look at future directions of education programming in the country;
• Support the Adolescent Girls Education ASA to conduct research and co-author the Sierra Leone input to the ASA
• Support implementation of the Quality Essential Health Services and Systems Support Project (QEHSSP) and project preparation in the health sector;
• Regularly follow up on agreed actions and conduct field monitoring and reporting of project activities as assigned;
• Support capacity building activities for ministries and other stakeholders;
• Review annual work plans, individual budgets, Terms of Reference, procurement documents, and other project-related documents as needed;
• Organize, support and participate in World Bank missions in close collaboration with SPJ, education and health task team leaders, and key government stakeholders
• Contribute to Aide Memoires, Implementation Status Reports, Implementation Completion Reports, and other Bank documentation as needed;
• Prepare inputs for notes, briefs, papers, and reports;
• Contribute to new project designs; and
• Assist with other related tasks, as assigned.
Selection Criteria
The World Bank Group is committed to achieving diversity in terms of gender, nationality, culture and educational background. Individuals with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated in the strictest confidence.
• Education and experience: - Master’s Degree in a social science field (for example, international development, economics, finance, sociology), or other relevant field with at least 5 years of relevant work experience.
• Experience working in Sierra Leone or similar countries is required, especially in providing technical assistance or working with government ministries, departments and agencies or development projects;
• Demonstrates knowledge about the social protection sector and its policies in Sierra Leone;
• Excellent editorial and communication skills;
• Ability to deliver results effectively in support of the team, taking personal responsibility to meet deadlines and quality standards.
• High motivation, initiative, a positive attitude, team spirit, and the capacity to work comfortably in a diverse environment.
• Ability to work under pressure and work flexibly on a range of assignments, to adjust to changing needs, and to prioritize among evolving tasks.
World Bank Group Core Competencies
The World Bank Group offers comprehensive benefits, including a retirement plan; medical, life and disability insurance; and paid leave, including parental leave, as well as reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities.
We are proud to be an equal opportunity and inclusive employer with a dedicated and committed workforce, and do not discriminate based on gender, gender identity, religion, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or disability.
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