Livelihoods, Climate and Resilience Advisor

With 75 years of experience, our focus is on helping the most vulnerable children overcome poverty and experience fullness of life. We help children of all backgrounds, even in the most dangerous places, inspired by our Christian faith.

Come join our 31,000+ staff working in nearly 100 countries and share the joy of transforming vulnerable children’s life stories!

Employee Contract Type:

Local - Fixed Term Employee (Fixed Term)

Job Description:

Livelihoods, Climate and Resilience Advisor

The Livelihoods, Climate and Resilience Advisor provides technical leadership for World Vision Malawi’s work to strengthen resilient livelihoods and household and community resilience across 28 Area Development Programmes in 16 districts, with local partners and through sponsorship-funded, grant-funded and humanitarian programming. This includes THRIVE, fuel-efficient cookstove programming, livestock pass-on using market-based approaches, climate adaptation and anticipatory action. As part of the Business Development and Impact technical team, the Advisor works closely with Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning, Finance, Communications, other sector advisors and Operations to strengthen programme quality and resource mobilisation, including access to climate finance.

Major Duties and Responsibilities

1.Resource Mobilisation, Donor and Government Engagement

• Lead technical contributions to resource mobilisation by identifying and tracking opportunities, developing fundable livelihoods, climate and resilience concepts, and contributing technical content, evidence and costed inputs to competitive proposals.
• Maintain current intelligence on sector developments, evidence, innovation, government policies and plans, donor priorities and funding mechanisms.
• Map and engage bilateral and multilateral donors, development banks, United Nations agencies, World Vision Support Offices and climate finance mechanisms, including the Green Climate Fund, Global Environment Facility and Least Developed Countries Fund, Adaptation Fund, Climate Investment Funds, bilateral climate finance programmes, and relevant carbon finance or other climate finance instruments.
• Track funding windows, eligibility and access requirements, national endorsement and accredited-entity routes, co-financing expectations and proposal timelines; identify opportunities to position World Vision Malawi as an implementing or consortium partner.
• Maintain a forward-looking funding pipeline and sector engagement plan. Prepare and conduct targeted donor and government meetings with clear agendas; document minutes, commitments, action owners and deadlines; follow up actions; and update the engagement plan and tracker.
• Work with Business Development and Impact, technical colleagues and Communications to develop capacity statements, competency statements, briefs, presentations, case studies and other evidence-based external engagement materials.
• Share opportunities and funding intelligence with the senior leadership team and Operations.

2.Programme Quality, Learning and Technical Support

• Provide technical guidance to livelihoods, climate adaptation, resilience, disaster risk reduction and anticipatory action programmes across World Vision Malawi’s Area Development Programmes and grant-funded, sponsorship-funded and emergency portfolio, delivered with local partners.
• Lead or facilitate national and district technical consultations with government counterparts, Operations teams and partners to address implementation challenges and promote quality.
• Develop, adapt and support the use of practical sector guidance, standards, tools and standard operating procedures, including for THRIVE, fuel-efficient cookstoves, market-based livestock pass-on, climate risk-informed design and anticipatory action.
• Work with Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning colleagues to develop and adapt assessment, monitoring and learning tools that capture relevant indicators, market and climate resilience outcomes, inclusion and safeguarding considerations and are practical for teams and partners.
• Contribute technical input to grant opening and management meetings; review programme and donor reports for technical accuracy and evidence; facilitate after-action reviews; and support application of lessons.
• Promote safeguarding, gender and disability inclusion, accountability to affected people and conflict sensitivity, and escalate significant risks promptly

3.Programme Design

• Lead or contribute to contextual analyses, needs assessments, climate and disaster risk analyses, and market and value-chain assessments to inform livelihoods, climate and resilience programme design across Area Development Programmes, sponsorship-funded and grant-funded programmes, humanitarian and anticipatory action, and funding opportunities for which World Vision Malawi is positioning or preparing proposals.
• Use evidence, government priorities, donor strategies and climate finance priorities to identify needs and design options.
• Co-design practical, market-informed and climate-resilient programmes with local partners, government structures, private sector actors, and relevant academic and technical institutions.
• Contribute to design workshops, theories of change, results frameworks, logical frameworks and proposal content, drawing on relevant approaches such as THRIVE, fuel-efficient cookstove programming, livestock pass-on using market-based approaches, climate-smart livelihoods, natural resource management, nature-based solutions and anticipatory action.
• Work with Business Development and Impact, Finance, Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning, and Operations to prepare feasible designs with clear activities, targets, staffing, implementation arrangements and costed budgets

4.Sector Coordination and Representation

• •  Represent World Vision Malawi in relevant national and district livelihoods, food security, climate and disaster risk management coordination mechanisms, including the Food Security Cluster and Agriculture Cluster when active; the Malawi National Anticipatory Action Technical Working Group; the Cash and Market Working Group and relevant cash technical working groups; the Malawi Vulnerability Assessment Committee and Integrated Food Security Phase Classification technical working group; relevant government climate change, agriculture, natural resource management and disaster risk management technical working groups; and the Civil Society Network on Climate Change (CISONECC).
• •  Engage with the Department of Disaster Management Affairs and relevant district coordination structures.
• •  Present World Vision Malawi’s work, evidence and results; contribute technical input; and respond to information and data requests within agreed timelines.
• •  Maintain and update the coordination engagement tracker; document decisions and actions; and share relevant updates with senior leadership and operational technical teams

5.Partnership Development

• Identify and assess suitable local partner organisations, private sector actors, financial service providers, and technical, academic or research institutions based on experience, geographic reach, capacity and complementarity with World Vision Malawi’s livelihoods, climate and resilience priorities.
• Support due diligence, capacity assessment and onboarding in line with World Vision partnership guidance.
• Clarify partner roles, market contributions and responsibilities in programme designs, proposals and budgets.
• Identify opportunities for formal collaboration with relevant ministries, departments, district authorities and institutions, including accredited climate finance entities where appropriate, and coordinate the drafting, review, approval and follow-up of memoranda of understanding with the appropriate World Vision Malawi leads.

Knowledge, Qualifications and Experience Required

• Master’s degree in Livelihoods, Climate Change, Disaster Risk Management, Environmental Studies, Agriculture, Natural Resource Management, International Development or a related field.
• A relevant bachelor’s degree with substantial additional experience may be considered. Proficiency in Microsoft Office and standard programme design and reporting tools.
• At least 5 years of progressively responsible experience in livelihoods, climate adaptation, resilience, disaster risk management, programme design, technical advisory or programme quality.
• Demonstrated experience in market-based approaches, partnership development, donor and government engagement, and design using contextual, market and risk analysis. Experience working with local partner organisations, government structures and private sector actors.
• Knowledge of Malawi’s context and experience in one or more areas such as resilient livelihoods, market systems, climate-smart agriculture, natural resource management, disaster risk reduction, anticipatory action, clean energy or social protection.
• Knowledge of Malawi’s livelihoods, climate, resilience and disaster risk management policies, strategies and coordination architecture; market systems and market-based programming; climate finance and humanitarian funding mechanisms; risk-informed and conflict-sensitive design; locally led adaptation; and results-based programme design, monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning, and adaptive management. Strong facilitation, analytical, writing and relationship-building skills

Applicant Types Accepted:

Local Applicants Only