Slope Stabilization Expert

About Asian Disaster Preparedness Center

ADPC is an autonomous international organization with a vision to reduce disaster and climate risk impacts on communities and countries in Asia and the Pacific by working with governments, development partners, international organizations, NGOs, civil society, private sector, media, and other key stakeholders. Established in 1986 as a technical capacity building center, ADPC has grown and diversified its expertise across social and physical sciences to support sustainable solutions for risk reduction across a broad range of specialist areas. With over 100 staff from 19 different nationalities and a wide range of professional expertise from atmospheric scientists to social scientists with experiences from all levels of engagement typically required for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and Climate Resilience (CR) in an effective manner. ADPC is a competent regional resource center and has seven thematic departments: ADPC Academy, Risk Governance, Climate Resilience, Urban Resilience, Health Risk Management, Preparedness for Response and Recovery, Geospatial Information. These are supported by Finance, Human Resources and Administration, and Strategic Planning departments. In addition to the departments, ADPC works on three cross-cutting themes: Gender and Diversity, Poverty and Livelihoods, and Regional and Transboundary Cooperation through permanent working committees. ADPC Strategy 2020 guides the organization in providing comprehensive risk reduction support to countries and communities in Asia and the Pacific. ADPC recognizes the importance of examining the linkages between disaster risk management, poverty reduction, gender equality, sustainability, rights-based approaches, climate change and regional cooperation. For details please refer to ADPC website at http://www.adpc.net/

Background

Disasters take a huge toll on the development agenda of SAR countries. Between 2000 and 2017, disasters in South Asia incurred estimated damages of US$ 149.27 billion. Public expenditure is under stress by the repeated need to reallocate capital budgets away from long term development planning and towards reconstruction activities in post-disaster environments. For example, since 2005, Pakistan has suffered losses on the order of US$ 16 billion due to natural disasters. In Bangladesh, 2007 Cyclone Sidr resulted in damages and losses of US$1.7 billion, or 2.6 per cent of GDP. To increase resilience and achieve climate commitments, there is a need for a transformational shift towards policies and institutions that enable climate-resilient investments. Investing in more resilient infrastructure is both profitable and urgent as disruptions are extremely costly for governments, households and private sector and large ongoing investments in infrastructure assets will have long-lasting repercussions as poor maintenance and natural disasters result in a vulnerable stock. With the financial support from the World Bank Group, ADPC will be implementing a five years’ project, titled “Climate Adaptation and Resilience Project for South Asia” (CARE). The project aims to create an enabling environment for climate resilience policies and investments across South Asia. This objective will be achieved through enhanced regional cooperation and knowledge exchange for climate resilience and adaptation and mainstreaming of resilience and adaptation in national policies, plans and investments. Scaling up the climate-resilient infrastructure strategy for strategic and rural roads plays a vital role in satisfactorily implementing all the required components of the project. It would involve development of standardized geospatial databases and other data for climate- related risk assessments on the transport sector. Accordingly, ADPC would like to hire a Slope Stabilization Expert, as a consultant, to deliver key outputs under the transport sector.

The objectives of this consultancy service are:

• To produce a report on the current status of slope stabilization & protection measures and suggest a set of innovative ways and means for slope stabilization and protection of roads against slope failure in Nepal.
• To work with the Resilient Transport Specialists to integrate and operationalize the slope stabilization methods in road design and construction guidelines in Bangladesh and Nepal.
• To lead the assessment of landslide susceptibility, hazard, vulnerability, and risk of the road networks in Nepal and Bangladesh (in consultation with Department of Roads and National Disaster Risk Reduction & Management Authority in Nepal and Local Government Engineering Department in Bangladesh).
• And finally to develop training modules related to slope stabilization and deliver training sessions as per the work plan.

Statement of Intent

The Slope Stabilization Expert will provide technical leadership as well as subject-matter- expert inputs to related project activities under the CARE for South Asia project’s Resilient transport sector on slope stabilization, landslide investigation and risk management activities. The expert will take a leading role in all the landslide hazard assessment related tasks for Bangladesh, and Nepal, which include the data needed to characterize climate change exposure and vulnerability, climate inclusive hazard and risk mapping; and also facilitate in guideline developments for slope stabilization and protection measures. This position is located in Bangkok, Thailand. Note: It is not the intent of this Terms of Reference to cover every aspect of the position requirements, rather to highlight the most important areas of personal and joint responsibilities.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Lead the landslide hazard assessment for Bangladesh and Nepal (for selected districts/provinces) as well as support the regional hazard, vulnerability and risk assessment (landslide part).
• Support the development of a hazard-risk and exposure-based scale-up plan for implementation of advanced bio-engineering slope stabilization and protection measures for Department of Roads, in consultation with the National Disaster Risk Reduction & Management Authority, Nepal.
• Support the integration of the updated Climate Change Policy 2019 into developing resilient road networks, slope stabilization and protection measures in Nepal;
• Provide inputs on review of climate risk assessment methods/approaches and summary of needs for the transport sectors;
• Support developing a climate-resilient infrastructure strategy for rural and strategic roads in Bangladesh (specific to landslide hazards);
• Support resilient transport specialist (regional) in developing regional road infrastructure development guidelines specific to landslide and slope stabilization;
• Support the Resilient Transport Specialists to integrate and operationalize the slope stabilization methods in road design and construction guidelines in Bangladesh and Nepal;
• Support capacity building activities related to landslide hazard and bio- engineering slope stabilization and protection measures.

Qualifications

The candidate should at least have:

• A master’s degree in Engineering Geology, Civil Engineering, Landslide Hazard, or related field;
• At least 7 years of experience in Landslide hazard assessment;
• Experience in climate risk assessment, and generation of related information;
• Experience in utilizing geospatial data and other data for climate-related assessments;
• Experience in developing climate-resilient strategies and guidelines, particularly for road infrastructure;
• Excellent English proficiency oral and written communication, including a demonstrated track record in technical report writing and ability to communicate technical matters effective to general audience.

Reporting Relationships

The Slope Stabilization Expert will report to the Project Director and work in close coordination with Director, Geospatial Department, ADPC. The specialist will also coordinate with the other CARE project specialists at the regional and national level to carry out different activities under the project.