Regional policy advisor on climate change (Europe, the CIS and Arab States)

Background

UNDP’s Environment and Energy Group (EEG) is based in the Bureau for Development Policy and is responsible for providing leadership and technical support to delivery of the Environment and Sustainable Development pillar of UNDP’s Strategic Plan. Its main focus is on helping countries develop the capacity to fully incorporate environmental sustainability into development at national and local, but also global and regional, levels. The principal areas of work are in environmental mainstreaming, environmental finance, adaptation to climate change, and local governance of resources, including energy.

There is increasing concern that climate change, including variability, could undermine the achievement of a number of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), most notably in poverty reduction. Consequently, developing countries are increasingly turning their attention to the formulation of comprehensive approaches to address climate change, in particular the human development and economic implications, and the investment decisions that need to be made to implement these.

UNDP country offices are, in consequence, receiving an increasing number of national requests for assistance with understanding the implications of climate change on national development and preparing integrated strategies and plans to manage anticipated challenges and opportunities. UNDP has played an important role assisting countries to access and deliver climate change financing, as implementing agency of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), joint manager of the National Communications Support Programme and by delivering initiatives like MDG Carbon, Capacity Development for Policy Makers, the MDG Achievement Fund, Africa Adaptation Programme, CC-DARE, UN REDD, Carbon Neutral and Climate Resilient Territories, and the 2007 Human Development Report on climate change (activities totaling more than 220 million USD in catalytic funding).

Acknowledging the need to incorporate climate change concerns into the design and implementation of its core development assistance at the national, regional and global levels, EEG has developed a Global Project “Integrating climate change risks into development planning and programming (ICCPP)”. This project is directly aligned with the UNDP 2008-2011 Strategic Plan – the Environment and Sustainable Development Focus and will contribute to operationalising pillar 4 in UNDP’s recently approved Climate Change Strategy (Integrate climate change into UN and UNDP development assistance at the global, regional and national levels). Thus, the project’s aim is to strengthen technical capacities of developing countries to integrate climate change risks and opportunities into human development based planning and programming. This will be achieved through the following two outputs:

Output 1: Support available for designing national climate change strategies, investment plans, programmes and/or related products.

Output 2: Capacities strengthened for integrating climate change risks and opportunities into national development assistance.

To achieve these outputs, the project will place Regional Policy Advisors in UNDP’s Regional Service Centers, which will in turn identify the needs and demands of national governments and the capacity development needs of UNDP country offices in order to guarantee that offices are able to address national and local needs.

The Regional Policy Advisor (RPA) is responsible for securing an adequate flow of information between the Regional Centers, BDP/EEG and the Country Offices in both Europe and the CIS and Arab States regions. The RPA has to put in place the best mechanisms to ensure that both the Senior Management and environment and energy teams at the Regional Center and COs, know about climate change related activities undertaken by BDP/EEG as well as by other UN bodies and major global and regional actors, in order to create synergies and guarantee coordination and a more efficient use of the resources of this and other projects.

He/she has to keep abreast of developments in global climate change negotiations and timely inform the regional constituents of the project, suggesting ways in which regional centers and country offices could support countries in the negotiation process. By actively interacting with the Climate Change teams in the Regional Centers and COs in Europe and the CIS and Arab States the RPA will deliver information on national needs for policy support in the regions to the senior management in the Regional Centers, the Project Manager, Project Technical Advisor and the Task Manager in EEG, thus supporting strategic planning for the project.

Duties and responsibilities

Summary of key function:

- Provide climate change policy advisory services
- Networking and partnerships
- Planning, implementing and reporting of project activities
- Under the joint supervision of Environment and Energy Regional Practice Leader for Europe and the CIS, the Regional Team Leader/Regional Technical Advisor for the Arab States, and the ICCPP Project Manager; and with technical guidance from the EEG Climate Change Policy Advisor, the climate change policy advisor will:

Provide policy advisory services

• Provide support to, and develop the capacity of, COs to engage in the climate change policy dialogue at national and regional level with key partners such as governments, donors, civil society.
• Provide substantive technical and intellectual inputs in order to support COs’ participation in the formulation of national low carbon and climate resilient development strategies and plans.
• Advise COs on ways to build capacity of governments in programming climate change related resources and provide advice on the effective use and management of different climate financing mechanisms.
• Develop technical and strategic position papers, presentations, advisory and briefing notes, as needed.
• Prepare regional inputs to policy briefs/position papers in collaboration with other practices that address links between climate change and other development concerns such as governance, private sector, poverty alleviation, gender, crisis prevention and recovery and capacity development.
• Provide climate change advisory services to colleagues from all practices of the regional centers and to officers in UNDP country offices. This includes reviewing key documents produced by other practices to ensure they account for and address climate change issues.

Networking and partnerships

• Provide regular briefings to country offices, Regional bureaus and regional centers´ senior management and governments on the status of international climate change negotiations, forthcoming events in the region, major regional initiatives under way and climate change projects being implemented by UNDP and other UN organizations in the region. These inputs should contribute to the development and strengthening of common UN positions regarding climate change issues in the region.
• Support the Country Offices in the development of strategic and thematic partnerships with governmental agencies, UN agencies and other important actors in climate change.
• Lead public relations activities, identifying opportunities and promoting results to ensure ICCPP project activities remain relevant and linked to UNDP processes.
• Secure an adequate flow of information between the Regional Centers, BDP/EEG, and the Country Offices. This includes putting in place mechanisms to ensure that both the Senior Management and Practice Leaders at the Regional Centers, and COs, know about climate change related activities undertaken by BDP/EEG as well as by other UN bodies and major global and regional actors; and delivering information on national needs for policy support to BDP, EEG, RBEC, RBAS, Heads of the Regional Centers, and the ICCPP Project Manager.
• Keep abreast of developments in global climate change negotiations and timely inform the regional constituents of the ICCPP project, suggesting ways in which regional centers and country offices could support countries in the negotiation process.
• Keep the Regional Centers and Country Offices informed about the developments of international climate change negotiations, in close coordination with other information and knowledge management networks, both within and outside UNDP, the UN system and the donor and development community, providing policy advice as needed.
• Ensure an optimal flow of information about initiatives, projects, international climate negotiations, and related issues between the stakeholders of the project in the Europe and CIS and Arab States regions.
• Promote the use and improvement of knowledge management mechanisms put in place by BDP/EEG to share information about climate change related initiatives.
• Liaise and coordinate with development partners (i.e. government, NGOs) and donors, building strategic alliances.

Planning, implementing and reporting of the project’s activities

• Lead strategic planning for the regional activities outlined in the project document and taking into account the priorities reflected in the regional business plan;
• Supervise the work of the consultants hired for the project.
• Organize joint planning meetings involving the regional bureaus both in headquarters and regional centers, the EEG/BDP and country offices to develop a workplan and a corresponding budget plan with clearly stated indicators of progress for the region.
• Develop quarterly workplans and expenditure plans based on the agreed annual work plan. Monitor project progress against annual and quarterly workplan and budget plans, and report on activities and results achieved.
• Propose value-added project activities based upon internal discussions and identification of in-house best practices and capacities.
• Consolidate and synchronize ICCPP activities with nationally implemented activities.
• Support the ICCPP project manager in the coordination of activities and initiatives.

Competencies

Corporate competencies

• Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards.
• Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP.
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.
• Treats all people fairly without favoritism.

Functional competencies

• Demonstrated project management skills, development and operational effectiveness.
• Strong strategic and visioning capacity, enabling her/him to understand the needs of developing countries regarding how to mainstream climate change in their development paths, and how UNDP can address these in the most effective and synergistic way.
• Demonstrated solid knowledge and relevant experience in climate change policy.
• Has good oral communication skills and conflict resolution competency to manage inter-group dynamics and mediate conflicting interests of varied actors.
• Good written communication skills, with analytic capacity and ability to synthesize project outputs and relevant findings for the preparation of quality project reports.
• Maturity and confidence in dealing with senior and high ranking members of agencies and national institutions, government and non-government.

Leadership and self-management

• Focuses on result for the client and responds positively to feedback.
• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude.
• Good team player, self starter, has ability to work under minimum supervision and maintain good relationships.

Required skills and experience

Experience and education

• Masters degree in environment, energy, economics or a closely related field.
• At least 7 years of experience in all areas related to climate change (i.e. environmental/ climate economics, adaptation, mitigation, technology transfer, investments and financing, land use, land-use change and forestry), with a good understanding of the developing country context with respect to climate change.
• Excellent organizational and project implementation skills Minimum of 7 years of experience in Europe and CIS and/or the Arab States region Minimum 3 years of experience in the field of international climate negotiations, particularly from the developing country and region’s perspective.
• Work experience in an international organization.
• Excellent knowledge of English, as well as writing, presentation and communication skills. Fluency in Arabic and other languages (Russian, French) spoken in the regions is an asset
• Submission of Applications
• Qualified candidates may submit their application, including a letter of interest, complete Curriculum Vitae and an updated United Nations Personal History Form (P.11) (available on our website), via email to [email protected]. Kindly indicate the vacancy number and the post title in the subject line when applying by email.

Additional considerations

• Applications received after the closing date will not be considered.
• Only those candidates that are short-listed for interviews will be notified.
• Qualified female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.
• UNOPS reserves the right to appoint a candidate at a level below the advertised level of the post.
• For more information on UNOPS, please visit the UNOPS website at www.unops.org.