Consultant Nutrition Analyst

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS

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ABOUT WFP

The World Food Programme is the worlds largest humanitarian organization saving lives in emergencies and using food assistance to build a pathway to peace stability and prosperity for people recovering from conflict disasters and the impact of climate change.

At WFP people are at the heart of everything we do and the vision of the future WFP workforce is one of diverse committed skilled and high performing teams selected on merit operating in a healthy and inclusive work environment living WFPs values (Integrity Collaboration Commitment Humanity and Inclusion) and working with partners to save and change the lives of those WFP serves.

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WHY JOIN WFP

• WFP is a 2020 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate.

• WFP offers a highly inclusive diverse and multicultural working environment.

• WFP invests in the personal & professional development of its employees through a range of training accreditation coaching mentorship and other programs as well as through internal mobility opportunities.

• A career path in WFP provides an exciting opportunity to work across the various country regional and global offices around the world and with passionate colleagues who work tirelessly to ensure that effective humanitarian assistance reaches millions of people across the globe.

• We offer an attractive compensation package (please refer to the Terms and Conditions section of this vacancy announcement).

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNMENT:

Background

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) is one of the leading global institutions helping to measure and alleviate malnutrition and has long been involved in efforts to expand the scope and impact of Large-Scale Food Fortification (LSFF). WFP supports national food and health systems across 73 countries as they strive to provide access safely and systematically to healthy nutritious diets and reduce micronutrient deficiencies in women children and the population at large. A key part of this work is the generation of data on food and nutrition security dietary diversity and access to nutritious foods and nutritious diets including food costs and expenditure and using these data to highlight where there are risks of insufficiencies by target group geography or vulnerability reflected as hunger (insufficient dietary energy and coping strategies) unaffordability of nutrient-adequate diets inadequate dietary diversity and likelihood of micronutrient deficiencies.

When households and specific household members are unable to meet their dietary micronutrient needs due to physical financial or sociological barriers it becomes necessary to consider additional pathways that can safeguard against micronutrient malnutrition. Food fortification is a powerful cost-effective intervention for improving micronutrient intake that can be adapted to many food vehicles and contexts and delivered through different platforms including both conventional commercial markets and food assistance including school meals and social protection programs.

Ultimately decisions about LSFF programmes and policy specifically regarding whether where what how and for whom to implement such initiatives require evidence of the likelihood that current diets are able to meet the recommended requirements for key vitamins and minerals of current intake including among specific sub-groups of the population as well as of consumption of different food vehicles (fortifiable) staples and condiments. They also require information about the extent to which different LSFF programmes and other interventions could assist in filling nutrient intake gaps for key populations. Such data are imperative to inform decisions across the LSFF ecosystem including policy formulation setting standards and determining whether LSFF is having an impact in general and with particular emphasis on those who are most vulnerable with a focus on gender. However due to cost time consumption and complexity of primary vitamin and mineral deficiency (VMD) data collection there are still many gaps in data needed to quantify the problem e.g. magnitude and distribution of micronutrient malnutrition and nutrient inadequacy as well as food consumption patterns within a population required for proper program design and exploration of new cost-effective vehicles and entry points for fortification. Further existing data or methods of obtaining data are limited in their ability to describe dimensions of VMD related to vulnerability in terms of gender age geography biological status and illness.

The WFP uses innovative data approaches to support governments make informed decisions about the design and effective implementation of nutrition policy and programs including the integration of nutrition objectives across food systems - to achieve maximum impact. The WFP Nutrition and Food Quality Services Fill the Nutrient Gap (FNG) analysis has been conducted in over 35 countries. The FNG estimates the cost and affordability of nutritious diets for households and nutritionally vulnerable individuals at the sub-national level and models the potential of programmes from across sectors to fill nutrient intake gaps including through fortification as well as increasing incomes increasing production and lowering prices of nutritious foods etc. Further WFPs Research Assessment and Monitoring Divisions HungerMapLive is widely used to inform humanitarian programming and food security situation monitoring. HungerMapLive displays real-time information on food insecurity nutrition and various relevant drivers using primary data collected using remote monitoring estimates generated using machine learning-based predictive analytics and publicly available secondary data pulled automatically through APIs.

The expansion of the Hunger MapLive to include a data layer on risk of dietary micronutrient inadequacy and the potential of different programs including LSFF to fill nutrient gaps has been identified as an opportunity to support programme and policy decision-makers from national governments and other stakeholders. This activity will bring together the analytical and government technical assistance expertise of the Nutrition and Food Quality Service and data collection and visualisation experience from the HungerMapLive Team.

About the team

The Modelling and Mapping risk of Inadequate Micronutrient Intake (MIMI) team aims to generate and increase access to modeled data on risk of dietary VMD at national and sub-national levels which will be critical to advocate for and inform the design and roll-out of large-scale food fortification as well as complementary programs.

Specifically MIMI works with academic and policy partners to develop innovative methods for modelling the risk of inadequate dietary micronutrient intake and the extent to which large scale food fortification (LSFF) (of different commodities and fortified according to different specifications) could reduce risk to inform policy decision-making and advocacy. MIMIs estimated and predictive analytical models use secondary data on food supply food consumption and expenditure socioeconomic status and climate among others and allow exploration of nutritional vulnerability by geography gender and socioeconomic characteristics. To date methods have been validated against dietary consumption and micronutrient status data in three countries. The outputs have been developed into inputs to display on interactive sub-national maps with the support of WFPs Hunger MapLive Team. Importantly the team are engaging with stakeholders in each of the focus geographies to support and document the application validation and uptake of modelled evidence to inform policy and advocacy and document the process. The initiative overall has benefited from WFPs in-country presence and partnerships with the relevant academic and civil society partners among other stakeholders to promote transparency provide a forum for discussion maximise stakeholder involvement at the global-level incorporate the views of potential end users at the country level and build community acceptance.

Between 2024 and 2026 MIMI will expand evidence generation and stakeholder engagement activities to an additional eight countries and explore the potential of integrating WFPs real-time data monitoring into the modelling and analysis. This TOR reflects work to be undertaken under this phase.

PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNMENT:

The Nutrition Analyst will play a critical role in the MIMI team led by the Learning and Innovation Unity within the WFP Nutrition and Food Quality Service. Under the supervision of the Analytics Lead and working as part of a dynamic multidisciplinary team of analysts data scientists policy and advocacy specialists this position will contribute to the development of analytical methods data analysis and data visualisation and present data to diverse stakeholders at the global- and country-level. The Analyst will bring technical expertise in the collection analysis modelling and visualisation of nutrition and food consumption or expenditure data especially data from Household Consumption and Expenditure Surveys to estimate food and nutrient intake and inform LSFF and other nutrition programmes and policy.

ACCOUNTABILITIES/RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Data collation cleaning and processing for 1-2 countries.
• Collaborate with APP HungerMapLive team integrate and apply machine learning approaches to enhance the analytical portfolio to improve the estimation of the risk of inadequate micronutrient intake and translate for actionable programme recommendations.
• Work collaboratively with team members and analytical partners to develop and test methods to calculate estimate the risk of inadequate micronutrient intake and conduct analysis for 1-2 countries.
• Contribute to thought leadership on the development and application of modelling to test the potential impact of LSFF and other micronutrient interventions to reducing risk of inadequate micronutrient intake.
• Present project specific analytical methods and findings to and participate in technical-level discussions with analytical partners and stakeholders.
• Develop reproducible pipelines to translate analytical findings into high-level accessible summaries/communication materials for senior stakeholders.
• Prepare and participate in dissemination and policy implementation activities to in-country stakeholders based on the data outputs and dashboard led by WFP Country Offices.
• Take the lead to draft or contribute to academic manuscripts for submission to peer-reviewed journals.
• Participate in field missions to focus countries and WFP country offices as required.
• Presentation at academic webinars conferences as relevant.
• Represent WFP during meetings with partners to contribute to technical discussions exchange of knowledge and experience advocate for appropriate interventions (based on an evidence base) and identify areas for potential collaboration.

DELIVERABLES AT THE END OF THE CONTRACT

• Analysis of data inputs from 1-2 countries to estimate risk of inadequate intake of individual micronutrients and micronutrients overall.
• Intervention modelling for 1-2 countries to estimate the contribution of different micronutrient interventions to reducing dietary VMD risks.
• Relevant analysis synthesis and thematic presentations and publications developed.
• Presentation of project methodology and results to diverse stakeholders nationally and internationally
• Development of peer-reviewed articles topic briefs and other external-facing project materials to present project methodology analysis and validation of results

QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE REQUIRED:

Education:

Masters degree or higher in Nutrition Public Health Epidemiology Medical Statistics Data Science or a related field

Experience:

• 4 years work experience some of that on informing development health or nutrition programmes would be a plus.
• Experience participating in research projects or analyses with diverse stakeholders and data inputs including research design data analysis and write up.
• Demonstrated ability to work effectively in a team environment especially with colleagues from diverse backgrounds.
• Familiarity cleaning merging and processing large complex datasets ideally Household Consumption and Expenditure Surveys.
• Experience analysing primary and secondary data.
• Experience presenting analysis findings to diverse audiences including government stakeholders programme staff and academic partners in a digestible and context-relevant format.
• Previous experience presenting research findings at academic conferences and meetings and through authorship of peer-reviewed journal articles.

Knowledge & Skills:

• Proficient in the analysis of quantitative data using statistical software such as R (preferred) or STATA.
• Analytical and problem-solving skills with a strong solution and action orientation.
• Flexibility sound interpersonal skills and cross-cultural sensitivity.

Languages:

• Advanced professional level of written and spoken English
• Professional knowledge of a second UN language (French Spanish Russian Arabic or Chinese) an asset.

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REASONABLE ACCOMMODATION

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