As a registered charity, founded in 1979, Action Against Hunger operates in 45+ countries. The international network of Action Against Hunger is represented in France, United Kingdom, Spain, Canada, USA and India. Teams in the field combat hunger on 04 fronts: Nutrition and Health, Food Security and Livelihoods (FSL), Water, Sanitation and hygiene (WASH), and Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS).

About Action Against Hunger-USA

Action Against Hunger-USA is a global humanitarian organization that takes decisive action against the causes and effects of hunger. We save the lives of malnourished children and we enable entire communities to be free from hunger. With more than 8,000 staff in over 45 countries, our programs reached 21 million people in 2018.

About the Country Program in Ethiopia

Action Against Hunger has been operational in Ethiopia since 1984 responding to both chronic and acute needs through a multi-sectoral strategy where Nutrition, Food Security and Livelihoods, WASH and Mental Health and Care Practices are integrated to have a meaningful impact on people’s resilience.

Action Against Hunger currently operates in 5 different regions with an anticipated 2020 yearly portfolio of 20m USD of emergency and resilience building programs, research and innovation. We have a country team of about 560 staff working out of 18 field offices across Ethiopia. Our main donors in Ethiopia are: ECHO, Europaid, UNHCR, OFDA, BPRM, SIDA, EHF, WFP and others.

General Assignments / scope of the Role:

The DNTHA under the direct supervision of Nutrition and Health Technical Advisor (NHTA) will provide technical support and capacity building to ACF-Ethiopia nutrition and health programs and assists in the development of a country strategy.  This post works closely with both the NHTA and Nutrition Program Managers at field level. As a direct support to ACF nutrition and health emergency response, at least 50% of the time will be spent in the field and depending on the number of emergencies could be up to 80%. He/She is also expected to collaborate with nutrition supervisors, field coordinators and other thematic area technical advisors to ensure viable coordination/integration between all ACF programs, including nutrition and health, WASH, FSL and MHPSS.

Duties and Responsibilities:

1.      Design, develop and evaluate Health and Nutrition Actions

§  Assessment and analysis of the health and nutrition situation in Ethiopia. 

§  Contribute to Action Against Hunger-Ethiopia Nutrition and Health country strategy.

§  Contribute technically for the development of sound and quality nutrition and health proposals.

§  Engage with other technical advisors to develop a multi-sectoral project proposal based on emerging evidenced and guidelines.   

§  Produce high quality, analytical project and programme progress update reports.

§  Support the development of nutrition and health budget proposals in coordination with the NHTA and ensure that BoQs are prepared as per the latest information received from various bases and in line with standard templets.

§  Closely support to various bases in nutrition and health project monitoring, efficient budget utilization and follow up as well as in ensuring the quality benchmarks for nutrition and health services are met and project are implemented as per the standard guidelines and protocols.

§  Identify programmatic challenges and bottle necks, suggest, propose and implement rectifying measures in close consultation with NHTA and nutrition program managers.

2.      External coordination, representation and communication in the field of Nutrition and Health.

§  Act as technical point of contact person and representative of ACF for sectoral and cluster nutrition and health coordination mechanisms such as ENCU and Health Cluster Coordination in addition to NHTA.

§  Participate and represent ACF in various sectoral and cluster nutrition and health coordination meetings and mechanisms at national and regional levels. (such as NGO health forum, UN and MoH sector and budget work plans).

§  Regularly and timely communicate NHTA, nutrition program managers and nutrition supervisors and other concerns colleagues on standard operating procedures, national guidelines, joint statements and recommended action plans related to nutrition (CMAM+IYCF) and health programmes.

§  Participate in and become member of various TWGs in sectoral and cluster nutrition and health coordination meetings.

§  Support NHTA in producing technical, strategic nutrition and health reports for internal and external purposes.

§  Regularly produce and share sectoral and cluster based nutrition and health update reports to respective coordination platforms as per standard guidelines and templets timely and in quality manner.

§  Ensure validation of the technical parts of protocols, SOPs and MoU with authorities, partners and other organizations (MoH, RHBs, ENCU, UNICEF, WFP etc.) when needed, and ensures their consistency between all areas of operations.

§  Participate in the collection of data from formal or informal meeting with other partners to get information on the nutrition and health needs in the country, and propose actions (assessments, surveys, program implementation) accordingly.

§  Together with the survey manger, act as a focal point for the dissemination of nutrition information from surveys, evaluations and assessments.

§  Advocate for implementation of new nutrition and health strategies as well as interventions, generate prove of concepts and evidenced that could serve as an input for policy change and adaptation at national level.

§  Plan, implement and document project success stories and lessons and share them internally and externally.

3.      Overall management of the NCA, Survey, Monitoring Evaluation Accountability and Learning (MEAL) activities:

§  Produce and submit period project update reports in line with standard donor templets and timelines and in consideration of having Sex and Age Disaggregated Data (SADD).

§  Review and compile monthly nutrition and health project APRs, project reports and provide timely feedback to nutrition program managers and make follow up on areas of improvement.

§  Ensure the quality of programme data and utilization of it for internal programming, Planning, monitoring and evaluation purposes.

§  Support in project design, M&E planning exercise, implementation and coordination between various nutrition projects.

§  Participate in conducting Lot Quality Assurance Sampling (LQAS) and Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) initiatives together with MEAL department..  

§  Provide support in the identification and articulation of nutrition and health survey/assessment needs within and outside ACF operation areas, particularly during humanitarian crisis in areas or as part of program monitoring.

§  Together with NHTA and Survey Manager ensures that all surveys, assessments and evaluations passed through relevant reviews and approval stages by various actors.

§  Ensure technical collaboration with key governmental authorities (Ministry of Health) and other relevant groups (e.g. nutrition agencies, UNICEF, other INGOs) during nutrition and health surveys, assessments and evaluations

§  Together with survey manager, ensure that the survey, assessments and evaluation methodologies (sampling, questionnaires, etc.) used in the field are in line with the defined approach validated by relevant offices, including ENCU.

§  Together with survey manager, ensure that survey reports are produced and reviewed timely internally and technical validated by regional/HQ focal points and ENCU/Emergency Nutrition Coordination Unit) with I , make presentation and coordinate in results dissemination at national and sub national level in coordination with Survey Manager.

§  Coordinate with NHTA and survey manager as well as MEAL TA on appropriate program /survey data analysis, result interpretation, and report writing and updates.

§  Conduct program MEAL activities as requested by the NHTA.

4.       Coordinate within the ACF team and provide technical support to the Nutrition and Health team

§  Ensure adherence to and standard practices of nutrition and health projects in line with national guidelines (CMAM+IYCF), protocols and SoPs in all operational areas by all nutrition and health staff.

§  Responsible to technically support CMAM and IYCF nutrition programming in ACF Ethiopia mission in close coordination with other program departments. 

§  Collaborate and communicate with technical and support advisors, program managers, DCD, CD, and any other ACF resource people in order to ensure the coherence of activities and reports in terms of ACF nutrition and health strategy.

§  Informing/updating the NHTA on assessment/survey implementation and any issues on a regular basis.

§  Participate in regular Grant Review and APR Meetings and provide updates on project implementation progresses and suggest and take doable action points to ensure timely and effect completion of projects. 

§  Participation in departmental coordination team meetings and in other general team or strategy meetings.

§  Follow up of logistics requirements for routine nutrition and health project activities, including nutrition and health supply procurement, undertaking of surveys in liaison with the Logistics Department and in collaboration with NHTA, program managers as well as field coordinators.

§  Provide periodic nutrition and health project progress updates to NHTA and collectively review project progress and produce progressive plan of actions based on the findings of the exercise. 

§  Participation in the overall mission and program strategy, narrative and financial project proposals, in collaboration with DCDP/NHTA/Log/Admin/FCs/CD and other relevant program  staff as necessary

§  Guide and technically assist nutrition program managers, nutrition supervisors in preparation of project plans, organizing various trainings, periodic reports, budget management and preparation of project related documents.

§  Support NHTA in preparing, organizing and documenting nutrition and health project documents, including project (grant) proposal, master beneficiaries and BoQ for each base.

§  Provide capacity building trainings for government and project staff on revised nutrition and health guidelines and protocols, ensure the availability and utilization of the documents in all bases.

§  Provide regular support and technical assistance to nutrition program managers and nutrition supervisors on the analysis of programme data, reviewing APRs, providing timely feedbacks to filed staff and proposing recommendations when necessary.

§ Support and ensure that nutrition supplies and commodities are available in all ACF bases and supply chain management is properly monitored to ensure continuity of essential nutrition and health services.

Educational / Professional Background 

§  Master’s Degree/University degree in Public Health, Nutrition, or related field from a recognized university/college with 5-to-7 years relevant experience in International NGOs setting is preferred; At least 3 years of experience in PHCU and essential services  implementation, CMAM+IYCF programming,  good knowledge and awareness on national nutrition and health strategies and policies, global nutrition and health dynamics, multispectral (Nutrition, Health and WASH) programming,  nutrition research, assessments and surveys. Practical knowledge and skill on SMART nutrition survey, rapid nutrition assessments methodologies, Nutrition Causal Analysis (NCA), Evaluations. Humanitarian experience in emergency lifesaving nutrition and health interventions. Exposure to sectoral and cluster coordination mechanism is advantageous.

Required skills:

§  Strong communication, networking and representation; good strategic and analytical skills; good experience in staff management and capacity building; team player and communicator; knowledge and skill on applicable computer software (Epi info, SPSS, stata, ENA, MS Offices); Fluent in English and Amharic both in written and spoken. Analytical, Project budget management, quality reporting and training provision, good management and representation competencies, leadership and team work.