Peace Responsiveness Specialist

Organizational Setting

FAO’s commitment to supporting sustainable peace, as outlined in its 2018 Corporate Framework to support sustainable peace in the context of Agenda 2030, underscores the Organization’s recognition of the integral relationship between peace, resilience and sustainable development. This Framework emphasizes the need for approaches on context/conflict analysis and conflict sensitivity, directly informing the design of programming in fragile and conflict-affected, including forced displacement, contexts. The Framework is predicated on a deliberative and systemic approach to conflict analysis and contributing to sustainable peace through conflict-sensitive programming.
The relevance of FAO’s mandate in addressing the drivers of disputes, tensions and conflicts, particularly in rural contexts, is widely recognised. Specific pathways exist through which FAO can contribute to sustaining peace, which can inform monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning approaches and frameworks. FAO has developed technical guidance and capacity development tools to support decentralized offices to be more ‘peace-responsive’. FAO has used its technical competencies and partnerships to directly contribute to sustaining peace, including working to reduce or address disputes and conflicts before they escalate further, as well as to reduce the risk of relapse into conflict in post-crisis contexts. This has included the integration of conflict sensitivity processes into the design, implementation and monitoring and evaluation framework of interventions in a variety of fragile and conflict-affected contexts in the RNE region.
The Near East and North Africa (NENA) Region is characterized by compounded shocks and crises, brought about by economic, natural, and human made hazards. This is against a backdrop of scarcity of water and natural resources that aggravate the impact of various shocks. Conflict remains to be the man driver of food insecurity in the region since 2013. FAO Regional Office for the Near East and North Africa (RNE) has four strategic Regional Priorities including the Regional Priority on Building Resilience to Multiple Shocks and Crises (RP4) envisaged to accelerate resilience pathways in the NENA region. Supporting FAO Country Offices in the region to design and implement evidence-based resilience and emergency projects is one of the main functions of RP4. Therefore, RP4 is planning stocktaking exercise with the overall aim of analyzing the extent of ‘peace-responsiveness’ in selected countries in the NENA region, by exploring the use of context/conflict analysis and conflict-sensitivity approaches in programme design, and the extent to which interventions have contributed to sustaining peace/localised peace.

Reporting Lines

Under the overall guidance and the supervision of the RP 4 Lead, the direct supervision and guidance of RNE Conflict Sensitive Programming Specialist with the technical/functional guidance of the Technical Officer (OER)/Lead, Conflict and Peace Unit (CPU) based at Headquarters, and in close collaboration with RP4 Core Team and FAO Offices in the target countries.

Technical Focus 

Protracted crises and conflicts; conflict analysis; conflict-sensitive programming; contributions to sustaining peace and stability; peace responsiveness; Humanitarian-Development-Peace Nexus (HDPN); natural resource management; conflict management.

Tasks and responsibilities

Under the overall supervision of the RP 4 Lead, the direct supervision and guidance of RNE Conflict Sensitive Programming Specialist with the technical/functional guidance of the Technical Officer (OER)/Lead, Conflict and Peace Unit (CPU) based at Headquarters, and in close collaboration with RP4 Core Team and FAO Offices in the target countries, the incumbent will:

•    COMPONENT 1: Develop a methodological approach (including use of ‘snowballing’, and in close consultation with FAO colleagues) to:
o    Assess the   extent to which selected FAO Country Offices of the RNE region (Sudan, Syria, and Yemen) have mainstreamed conflict-sensitive and peace-responsive approaches in their programmes and projects;
o    Identify and document projects and/or activities within the same Country Offices which either explicitly or implicitly contribute to sustaining/localised peace.
The methodology should closely align with the contributory pathways to sustaining peace articulated in the joint FAO-Interpeace paper, Operationalizing Pathways to Sustaining Peace, which has been validated through country, sub-regional, regional and HQ rounds of feedback.

•    COMPONENT 2: In consultation with teams of the selected Country Offices and the RNE Field Programme Team, with ongoing discussions with relevant RNE and HQ colleagues, carry out a stocktaking exercise of projects, activities and/or policy engagements implemented in the selected countries. The stocktake should assess and indicate, to the extent possible:

o    How conflict sensitivity has been integrated into project cycles and programmatic approaches, and, where possible, the risks associated with not being conflict-sensitive (linked with the Evaluation of FAO’s Contribution to the Humanitarian-Development-Peace Nexus: 2014-2020, Recommendation 3 (Learning more systematically from FAO’s experiences);
o    Direct and indirect contributions to sustaining/localised peace, and the presence of data and evidence to support peace-contributing assumptions;
o    Promising practices, activities and other entry points for conflict-sensitive programming and peace responsiveness within the targeted Country Offices;
o    Based on the results of the stock-taking, identify entry points for programming, develop recommendations and action plan on how to strengthen conflict-sensitive and peace responsiveness capacities in FAO Country Offices.

CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING

Minimum Requirements

•    Advanced university degree or a university degree with 2 years of experience in International Law, Political Science, Development Studies, International Relations, Social Sciences, Conflict and Peace Studies, Conflict Analysis, or other related discipline
•    Minimum of 4 years of relevant experience in humanitarian and/or resilience programming in insecure contexts with specific experience in natural resource management, stakeholder engagement, access negotiations, conflict analysis and/or conflict-sensitive programming as well as experience in designing and delivering capacity building programmes and activities.
•    Working knowledge of English (level C).

FAO Core Competencies

•    Results Focus
•    Teamwork
•    Communication
•    Building Effective Relationships
•    Knowledge Sharing and Continuous Improvement

Technical/Functional Skills 

•    Work experience in more than one location or area of work
•    Protracted crises and conflicts; conflict analysis; conflict-sensitive programming; contributions to sustaining peace and stability; peace responsiveness; Humanitarian-Development-Peace Nexus (HDPN); natural resource management; conflict management.