Lead Exposure - Market Shaping

Overview

WJCF is an Indian non-profit organisation committed to saving lives by reducing the burden of disease and strengthening government-owned, high-quality health systems. Since 2007, WJCF has combined data-driven approaches and deep public health expertise with strong government partnerships to design, implement, and scale solutions across India’s national and state health programmes. We work for and at the service of governments — supporting the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare and State Departments of Health to build systems that are strong, sustainable, and led by Indian institutions.

As an Indian organisation, WJCF brings an unmatched depth of contextual understanding of India’s health system architecture, policy landscape, and implementation realities across diverse geographies and population groups. This local institutional credibility, combined with global technical rigour, is central to WJCF’s effectiveness as a partner to governments and donors.

Our work is built around four complementary roles: as a Trusted Government Partner, co-designing programmes and strengthening health system architecture; as an Operational Partner, translating strategies into effective on-the-ground delivery; as a Market Shaper, improving the availability and affordability of health commodities; and as an Ecosystem Catalyst, convening governments, development partners, academia, and the private sector to drive solutions at scale.

WJCF’s programme portfolio spans thematic areas like hepatitis, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, vector-borne diseases), syphilis, cervical cancer, diabetes, maternal and childhood anaemia, immunisation, under-5 diarrhoea and pneumonia, sexual and reproductive health, Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri – Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY), Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM), hypoxemia and oxygen, safe drinking water, sickle cell disease, presbyopia, lead poisoning, and cross cutting thematic areas like AI and Health, integrated disease surveillance, and climate and health. We currently support programmes across 19 states and union territories, with teams working at national, state, district, and sub-district levels.

Our people are our greatest asset. WJCF brings together a talented, diverse team of professionals from public health, analytics, consulting, healthcare, the development sector, and academia, all united by a shared commitment to improving health outcomes for the people of India. We are entrepreneurial, action-oriented, and deeply grounded in the communities and systems we work in. Our field teams collectively bring hundreds of years of experience managing public health programmes across the country.

WJCF collaborates with a range of international and domestic partners and donors to advance its mission, including an affiliation with the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI), a global health organisation with which WJCF shares a common mission and values.

Programme Overview

Lead (Pb) exposure is a silent yet devastating global health crisis, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Research from UNICEF and other partners estimates that 1 in 2 children in LMICs have elevated blood lead levels, contributing neurological damage, reduced cognitive development, and a variety of health impacts.

Lead exposure in India arises from multiple sources, with leaded decorative paints and used lead-acid batteries (ULABs) representing the two most significant. Despite a regulatory limit of 90 ppm for lead in decorative paints, widespread non-compliance among SME manufacturers means lead chromate pigments continue to enter the paint supply chain. ULABs are the single largest source of secondary lead in India, with approximately 1.1 million metric tonnes generated annually across the automotive, telecom, inverter, and UPS sectors; informal recycling of spent batteries releases lead into surrounding communities, disproportionately affecting children.

WJCF has launched a new Lead Exposure Program, building on its proven market shaping capabilities and experience partnering with governments to address large-scale and cross-sectoral health challenges. Program priorities include: 

• Devising and implementing strategies to support paint SME manufacturers in transitioning from lead inputs to safer and sustainable alternatives (organic pigments)
• Scoping gaps and intervention areas for market-shaping opportunities across the lead exposure program, spanning diagnostics (pXRF), treatment (chelating agents), and source-side mitigation (plastics, other sources)

The incumbent will support across multiple market shaping workstreams as detailed below.

Position Details

We are seeking an analytically rigorous and entrepreneurial individual to support the design, implementation, and monitoring of WJCF’s market shaping interventions. The role involves market assessment, value chain analysis, stakeholder interviews, policy analysis, and financial modelling. It spans government, private sector, and civil society actors, and sits at the intersection of commercial strategy, environmental health, and government engagement.

• Location: New Delhi, with domestic travel to pilot states.
• Duration: Up to 6 months, extendable based on performance

Responsibilities

1. Market Strategies to Transition Paint SMEs to Safer Alternatives

Transition to Lead-Free Paints

• Support the scoping and implementation of targeted pilot interventions to enable industry transition to lead-free paints, including addressing SME barriers to transition, supply chain solutions, and related market-shaping measures.

Pilot Planning & Design

• Develop detailed pilot blueprints for selected interventions: implementation plans, resource requirements, partnerships, budgets, timelines, risk assessments, and mitigation strategies.
• The intervention hypotheses under consideration are:
  • Aggregate raw material demand: Test the feasibility of aggregating demand from medium-sized paint manufacturers to secure lower-cost lead-free inputs and incentivize greater reformulation of paints to lead-free alternatives.
  • Leverage institutional procurement: Identify high-volume institutional paint buyers and work with them to adopt lead-free procurement commitments, creating demand-side pressure for manufacturers to reformulate their products.
• Prepare implementation toolkits and support materials for roll-out as needed.

Exploring Lead-Free Pigment Transitions in Non-Paint Sources

• Mapping lead and lead-free pigment supply chains, assess switching barriers, and evaluate the feasibility of lead-free alternatives in other sources (plastics, turmeric)
• Identify opportunities and support concept to proposal writing, including defining and prioritizing intervention areas.

2. Market Shaping for Portable XRF (pXRF)

Accelerate access to affordable pXRF for research and routine government environmental testing

• Conduct a supplier and distribution landscape of pXRF devices
• Assess device availability and pricing across suppliers
• Map demand with stakeholders, including current pXRF use and unmet needs
• Understand procurement pathways and regulatory frameworks
• Assess end-user needs to evaluate product-market fit

3. Market shaping for Chelating Agents

Enable access to affordable oral chelation therapy

• Expanding access to chelation drugs through improved sourcing and procurement to reduce costs and enable addition in essential drug lists
• Assessing alternative formulations or delivery approaches that could improve affordability and feasibility in low-resource settings

4. Cross-cutting

Stakeholder Engagement and Reporting

• Support proposal development, including concept notes, funding proposals, and progress reports.
• Support stakeholder management across donor, government, private sector, and civil society partners.
• Maintain programme tracking tools and contribute to milestone monitoring.

*Scope can potentially evolve basis developing understanding of the above lead exposure program areas

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in business administration, economics, public policy, or a related field; a postgraduate degree is preferred.
• Minimum 3 years of relevant experience with a strong analytical focus, such as market assessment, supply chain analysis, commercial strategy, or policy analysis. Strategy consulting experience is preferred.
• Experience in primary research, such as stakeholder interviews, value chain mapping, or market assessments in complex, multi-stakeholder settings.
• Strong quantitative and qualitative analytical skills, and comfort building unit economics or financial models.
• Strong strategic thinking, with the ability to identify and pursue high-impact opportunities in complex, uncertain, and changing environments.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to produce high-quality reports, briefs, and presentations for government, donors, and technical audiences.
• An entrepreneurial mindset, with the ability to work independently, lead workstreams end-to-end, and to propose and carry out new initiatives.

Last Date to Apply: 21 November, 2026