Consultant (PHP web programmer)

United Nations Core Values:

Integrity • Professionalism • Respect for diversity

Background

The International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) is a multi-disciplinary and multistakeholder platform to enable societies to increase their resilience to natural, technological and environmental disasters and to reduce associated environmental, human, economic and social risk and losses. A range of United Nations organizations and international partners participate in cooperation with Governments and civil society organizations. The implementation of the ISDR is supported by a secretariat lead by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction. The secretariat’s main functions are policy coordination, advocacy and information management, at the international and regional levels, to ensure synergy between disaster reduction strategies and those in the socio-economic and humanitarian fields.

In January 2005, the World Conference on Disaster Reduction adopted the Hyogo Declaration and the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015: Building the Resilience of Nations and Communities to Disasters. The Hyogo Framework constitutes the essential guide for implementation of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction and represents the key policy framework for reducing risk and to strengthen community resilience. The Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction, established by the UN General Assembly in 2006, is the main global policy forum for disaster risk reduction, and is complemented by a system of regional, thematic and national platforms, which bring together all relevant stakeholders.

Organizational setting and reporting relationships

The Consultant will work under the direct supervision of the Senior Information Management Officer, UNISDR Geneva.

Objectives and targets

The UNISDR content management system (CMS) has been developed to support all of the UNISDR information management tools and websites including the Campaign, UNISDR website, PreventionWeb, and the UNISDR Intranet. In addition, content from this CMS is syndicated and appears automatically on several partner websites.

Due to the expansion of all the related websites and increased demand for new utilities, services and content syndication, the work plan for the information management unit has several new projects which involve additions and new functional additions to previously completed website sections.

Key outputs

• PHP functions for the programming of the UNISDR web applications
• Database design for Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) monitoring application enhancements.

Competencies

Professionalism: Proven experience in PHP and JavaScript programming and MySQL database design for distributed data entry and website content management for large scale websites.

Planning and Organizing: Demonstrated effective organizational skills and ability to handle work in an efficient and timely manner, working to tight deadlines.

Technological Awareness: Fully proficient computer skills, particularly in using relevant information databases, internet services, contact sources.

Qualifications

Education

• Advanced university degree (Master’s degree or equivalent) in communications, computer science or other related fields.
• A first-level university degree in combination with qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience

• A minimum of 5 years of working experience in development of monitoring and data entry systems for large scale websites.

Language skills

• Fluency in written and spoken English