Summary
Date Posted: Tuesday, March 22, 2022 , Base Salary: Not Disclosed

JOB DETAILS:
Health Specialist/Health Economist
Job #: req16586
Organization: World Bank
Sector: Health/Nutrition/Population
Grade: GF
Term Duration: 3 years 0 months
Recruitment Type: Local Recruitment
Location: Nairobi,Kenya
Required Language(s): Somali and English
Preferred Language(s):
Closing Date: 4/4/2022 (MM/DD/YYYY) at 11:59pm UTC

Description
Do you want to build a career that is truly worthwhile? 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 and promoting shared prosperity. 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.


EASTERN & SOUTHERN AFRICA REGION CONTEXT
Home to about 700 million of Africa’s people, Eastern and Southern Africa is a geographically, culturally and economically diverse region of 26 countries stretching from the Red Sea in the North to the Cape of Good Hope in the South. Children under 18 make up almost half of the total population. The sub-region boasts of some of the world’s richest human and natural resources and, apart from South Africa, the countries are predominantly raw material exporters.

The sub-region harbors some of Africa’s protracted conflicts, rendering many of its countries fragile, while significant gaps in education, health, and skills development continues to keep people from reaching their full potential. This creates a huge development challenge, impacts heavily on the lives and livelihoods of people, and hinders regional integration and trade. But it also creates an opportunity to work closely with country leaders, civil society, development partners, and young people to chart a brighter course for the future.

The World Bank’s Eastern and Southern Africa Region, comprised of approximately 1,207 staff mostly based in 26 country offices, has been helping countries realize their considerable development potential by focusing on the following priorities:

• Creating Jobs and Transforming Economies: We are working with countries across Africa to stimulate job creation and economic transformation by leveraging all sources of finance, expertise, and solutions to promote investment.

• Building up the Digital Economy: We are supporting Africa’s vision to ensure that every African individual, business, and government is connected by 2030 – a vision that, if realized, can boost growth by up to 2 percentage points per year, and reduce poverty by 1 percentage point per year in Sub-Saharan Africa alone.

• Institutions more Efficient and Accountable: Our support is helping governments strengthen public policy processes, manage resources effectively, and reinforce fair and reliable delivery of public services.

• Investing in People: We are at the forefront of helping African countries accelerate human capital gains and empower women by improving their access to education and skills acquisition, sexual and reproductive health services, and employment opportunities. With the influx COVID-19, we are mobilizing financial support and timely analysis and advice to countries across the sub-region deal with the pandemic.

• Supporting Climate Change Mitigation and Adaption: In the face of increasing climate-related risks, we are working with African countries to advance efforts to adopt renewable energy, climate-smart agriculture, and green infrastructure. A number of East African countries are currently facing a debilitating Desert Locust infestation, threatening the already precarious food security situation. The Bank has put together a program to help affected countries deal with the scourge.

• Addressing the Drivers of Fragility, Conflict, and Violence: Given the cross-border nature of conflicts in Africa, we are employing an approach that simultaneously focuses on the drivers of fragility while also supporting well-targeted regional initiatives to create opportunities for peace and shared prosperity.

• Building Partnerships and Working across the African Continent: We are scaling up our work on regional integration, taking a holistic view of the continent that covers both North and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Eastern and Southern Africa (E AFR) Region:
https://www.worldbank.org/en/region/afr/eastern-and-southern-africa 

HEALTH, NUTRITION AND POPULATION GLOBAL PRACTICE CONTEXT
The central contribution of the Health, Nutrition, and Population (HNP) Global Practice to the World Bank’s twin goals is to enable the achievement of Universal Health Coverage (UHC), in which all people are effectively covered by essential health services, and nobody suffers undue financial hardship because of illnesses. The HNP Global Practice includes staff members in Washington, DC and many country offices. The HNP Global Practice works with and across multiple sectors, in recognition of the fact that HNP outcomes often depend on actions that lie outside the HNP 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 heath-relevant institutions within and outside the health sector; (vi) harness multi sectoral policies and investments for better health outcomes; and (vii) develop and learn from rigorous impact evaluations.


UNIT AND COUNTRY CONTEXT
The HNP team in Africa is divided into four units, two for Eastern and Southern Africa and two for Western and Central Africa. Each of the units covers threes CMUs. HAEH2 covers the DRC, Kenya, and South Africa CMUs, which collectively comprise of thirteen countries across Eastern and Southern Africa and is responsible for a large program of operational and analytic work.

Somalia is transitioning towards increased stability through institutional and political reforms, which began with the adoption of a provisional constitution and a Federal Government in 2012. The federal system established under the 2012 provisional constitution carved out four new Federal Member States (FMS), resulting in a total of six under the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS). Service delivery challenges are also underpinned by very limited financing for health in Somalia. Real per capita expenditure on health is approximately US$13 per person per year (2019), far below Sub-Saharan Africa’s average of US$204 (2019).

The World Bank recently approved the first health sector project which aims to improve the coverage of essential health and nutrition services in project areas and strengthen stewardship capacity of Ministries of Health. The total proposed financing envelope for the Project is US$100 million. As part of the response to COVID-19 , WB has recently approved a new $45 Million to support the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines in the country. Additional support to the health sector prior to these two new projects has been provided through (i) Somalia Recurrent Cost and Reform Financing (RCRF I,II and III) project which mainly supports the training and deployment of female health workers and (ii) Somalia Crisis and Recovery Project (SCRP) which support the non-vaccine related aspects of COVID-19.

Somalia became a Global Financing Facility (GFF) country in 2019, an important step towards reducing health sector fragmentation, improving partner alignment, and strengthening the Government’s stewardship role, which will be further supported by the Project. Somalia is currently developing an Investment Case (IC) to improve health outcomes by enhancing health service coverage and quality, developing Government stewardship capacity, and mapping resources available in the health sector to improve partner alignment and reduce health sector fragmentation.


THE POSITION

Female candidates are especially encouraged to apply.

The unit is looking for a motivated individual to join the Kenya team as a Health Specialist/Economist supporting the HNP portfolio of health projects and analytical work in Somalia. The position is based in Nairobi, Kenya.

Note: This is a nationally recruited position intended for Somali nationals or other nationalities of Somali origin. Applicants who do not meet either of these criteria will not be shortlisted. Remuneration is based on the national market in Kenya.

Duties and Accountabilities:
The Health Specialist/Economist will have the following key responsibilities, inter alia:

• Provide implementation support, as needed, to the Bank’s HNP portfolio in Somalia, which includes: (i) Improving Healthcare Services in Somalia (“Damal Caafimaad” Project; (ii) COVID-19 Vaccine Emergency project; (iii) health components under (a) Somalia Crisis Recovery Project (SCRP) and (b) Recurrent Cost and Reform Financing (RCRF) Project; and (iv) support for several health Advisory Services and Analytics (ASAs).
• Contribute to the technical discussions and monitoring of the Bank portfolio in close collaboration with the relevant government agencies and development partners.

• Assist the task team with policy dialogue, communications, and interactions with government counterparts, country stakeholders as well as development partners.

• Contribute to sector-specific inputs for various operational products/outputs (e.g., sector/country briefings, background reports, portfolio performance reviews, etc.).

• Contribute to and participate in missions of the health team in Somalia as directed.

• Respond to ad hoc information requests from internal and external parties.

The work will be substantive in nature, requiring frequent missions in the field and interactions with various external and internal counterparts in Somalia.
The Health Specialist/ Economist will report to the HNP Practice Manager for HAEH2. As a field-based staff member, the selected Health Specialist or Health Economist will work closely with the respective Task Team Leaders from HNP GP and other GPs as well as with staff of the the Country Management Unit (CMU). The Health Specialist/Economist will be subject to all World Bank regulations and guidelines applicable to staff.

Selection Criteria
• At least a Master’s degree in health economics, public health, or a related field. A PhD would be considered an added advantage.
• A minimum of 5 years of full-time relevant professional experience is required.

• Consistent record of working on health, nutrition, and population issues.

• Strong knowledge of and experience with the health sector in developing countries, including institutional set up, health policies and programs, challenges, and priorities.
• Demonstrated expertise in policy dialogue and the ability to interact effectively with Government officials and a range of partners at various levels.

• Prior experience working with/on health systems in Somalia and/or other FCS environments in Sub-Saharan Africa.

• Prior experience in an international development institution (public, NGO or private) or academia is preferred.

• Ability to analyze cross-sectional household and facility-level survey data as well as macro-level time-series budgetary and other relevant data.

• Familiarity with statistical analyses, econometric methods, and related software, preferably STATA.
• Demonstrated track record of synthesizing complex analytics and results into user-friendly outputs, including PowerPoint presentations, Policy Briefs and Working Papers.

• Shown analytical skills linking strategic and quantitative analysis, and the ability to inform high-level policy dialogue through strong communications (including writing) skills, including data visualization skills.

• Respectful and client-engagement skills, and demonstrated success working with multi-disciplinary teams.

• Strong interpersonal and communication skills.
• Ability to work independently with limited supervision and handle multiple tasks, meet changing priorities, and deliver high-quality analysis and work on-time.

• Willingness to travel extensively in country and possible to other countries as necessary, including to remote rural areas.

• Fluency in English (excellent oral and written communication skills) is required, with ability to prepare documents on complex subjects, speak and write persuasively, and present ideas clearly and concisely.

Work Hours: 8

Experience in Months: 60 12:00:00 AM Postgraduate Degree

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