Field and Cash-Based Intervention Assistant

Details

Mission and objectives

UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, is a global organization dedicated to saving lives, protecting rights and building a better future for refugees, forcibly displaced communities and stateless people.

Context

UNHCR is a global organization protecting people forced to flee their homes because of conflict and persecution. We work in over 130 countries, helping millions of people with life-saving support, safeguarding fundamental human rights, and helping them build a better future (see www.unhcr.org). UNHCR Bulgaria supports the Government of Bulgaria in providing a response to the Ukraine refugee situation and also in ensuring protection and inclusion space to other refugees and asylum seekers in Bulgaria. UNHCR supports the government to ensure policies and legislation are in line with international standards and promotes a comprehensive refugee response, grounded in multi-stakeholder, “whole-of-society” approaches that include refugees, local authorities, international organizations, civil society, private sector, and other stakeholders.
Since the escalation of the conflict in Ukraine in February 2022, over 2.4 million refugees from Ukraine have entered Bulgaria. The Government of Bulgaria has granted Temporary Protection to more than 181,000 refugees from Ukraine, of whom the majority are women and children. Around 46,400 remain with valid Temporary Protection in the country as of May 2024. Some 6,000 refugees from Ukraine are hosted under the state-sponsored accommodation programme, including hotels and state recreational facilities located predominantly in the Black Sea regions and other locations throughout the country.
Additionally, Bulgaria as an external EU border, plays a strategic role in refugee protection within Europe. In 2023, Bulgaria’s State Agency for Refugees registered over 22,500 asylum seekers, most from Syria and Afghanistan, which exceeded the asylum application numbers from 2022. The Government operates six reception centers for the registration, status determination, and accommodation of asylum seekers.
UNHCR supports government-led efforts to provide key protection – including legal assistance, information on services, education, and psychosocial support – reception and accommodation, as well as the delivery of core relief items for winterization and cash assistance for the most vulnerable groups. The post-distribution monitoring of UNHCR’s 2023 cash assistance for more than 7,000 refugees finds that the main needs addressed were food and health costs. UNHCR conducts various types of assessments among refugees to assess their needs, capacities, and coping mechanisms and identify those with specific needs to ensure their access to specialized services. Some of these activities are implemented directly by the Agency, with others implemented through partner agencies or service providers.
This United Nations Volunteers (UNV) assignment is part of UNHCR’s cash-based interventions program under the Protection Unit’s Field team.

Task description

The UN Volunteer will support UNHCR in implementing UNHCR’s Cash-Based Interventions program as part of the Protection Unit. Moreover, the volunteer may also support UNHCR in conducting various monitoring and vulnerability assessments across the country focusing on the major locations of the facilities accommodating refugees and asylum-seekers.
The main tasks and responsibilities of the UN Volunteer will be as follows:
• Provide technical support to the Head of Protection and supervisor on planning activities within the area of cash-based assistance and interventions (CBI), an integral part of UNHCR programmes, including assessments, planning and budgeting, technical choices, legal and regulatory aspects implementation modalities and coordination.
• Under the supervision of the Inter-Agency Coordination Officer, support the monitoring and multi-functional team coordination process for cash assistance, with proper collection, use, and monitoring of baselines, standards and indicators needed to measure and analyze CBI’s performance.
• Support in analyzing trends and target interventions including CBI expenditure, upstream and downstream activities.
• Assist in data management tasks as required, e.g. generating data for evidence-based decisions.
• Assist in fulfilling CBI-related reporting requirements.
• Help in providing information and communication to key stakeholders as well as refugees on UNHCR’s cash assistance program, in close coordination with the Communication with Communities colleagues.
• Support the use of UNHCR corporate tools and systems.
• Maintain protection presence and monitoring through regular field missions and reports, making direct contact with people UNHCR works with, host communities, local authorities, and partners.
• Identify and record/refer refugees with specific needs who require specialized services in accordance with UNHCR specific needs/vulnerability codes.
• Perform other related duties as required.