Innovative Financing Officer

Description

and will be considered for the screening, shortlisting and selection of candidates.

Desired Candidate Profile

Climate change and environmental crises such as deforestation are critical problems in displacement contexts. In 2020, UNHCR conducted the first estimate of deforestation impacts in refugee situations, estimating that 20-25 million trees are cut down in and around refugee settlements each year, 90% of which are cut down to due to the need for cooking fuel. This results in large-scale environmental and social devastation. The resulting environmental problems include soil erosion, landslides, and desertification, which threaten safe living conditions and livelihoods for refugees. As deforestation increases, women and girls must travel longer distances for cooking fuel collection, resulting in greater vulnerability to sexual and gender-based violence. In addition, competition over common, depleting natural resources increases conflict between refugees and hosts. This is why climate action is one of UNHCR’s top strategic priorities, as outlined in the recently issued Strategic Framework for Climate Action, and Sustainable Safe Cooking Energy is one of the four Strategic Outcome Areas targeted by UNHCR’s Global Strategy for Sustainable Energy.

To address this challenge, UNHCR has launched The Refugee Environmental Protection Fund (REP Fund) initiative, which aims to create an innovative and sustainable financing mechanism that invests in impactful refugee and host community reforestation and clean cooking programs.

The REP Fund would invest in the technical improvement and verification of the environmental programs as carbon credits. These first-ever large-scale refugee-generated carbon credits would be saleable on the global carbon credit markets, and part of the sale would replenish the REP Fund, making it more financially sustainable over time. More importantly, it would for the first time explicitly link refugees and host communities to the global carbon markets, empowering displaced communities and their hosts to become part of the global movement to combat climate change.

The impact of the REP Fund would be multi-faceted, incorporating holistic benefits across environmental and social dimensions, including carbon mitigation, green jobs, and gender protection:

Environmental: tens of thousands of hectares restored with green cover, with an estimated 2.5 million+ tons of CO2 sequestered/year on average; lowered risk of landslides and other local environmental risks caused by deforestation.

Social: Clean cooking solutions for hundreds of thousands of vulnerable refugee and host community families; greater peace and security between refugee & host communities.

Economic: thousands of ‘green' jobs created in reforestation and clean cooking supply chains in under-developed areas in developing countries.

Gender: Health improvements from reduced cooking smoke inhalation by primarily women and girls; lowered risk of gender-based violence while collecting firewood.

UNHCR has already invested significant technical capacity to develop the REP Fund concept, resulting in key early support already secured. UNHCR is partnering with a European development bank (“DB”) on this initiative – a strong example of an innovative humanitarian-development nexus partnership. UNHCR has also received strong support from donors, corporate partners, and potential host countries for REP Fund projects. The REP Fund has been officially launched at UNHCR High Level Officials Meeting (HLOM) in December 2021 – please see the REP Fund website and launch video here: www.unhcr.org/refugee-environmental-protection-fund.

Exact countries that the REP Fund would invest in would be confirmed by feasibility studies and Country Offices & management’s interest in participating. The sites under consideration for the initial pilot projects are located in Rwanda, South Sudan, Sudan, and Uganda and feasibility assessments in these sites are currently being finalized. Once established, it is expected that sites in other countries will be added to the scope of the Fund, and that projects in existing sites will be expanded, as appropriate.

Duties and Responsibilities

- Ensure project delivery and implementation of the REP Fund initiative as agreed with UNHCR Steering Committee and in coordination with the DB that will be the financial and legal host of the Fund’s programs. This includes coordinating the financial, technical, administrative, and partnership aspects of the REP Fund initiative.
- Financial: Update the REP Fund financial model with actual data gathered from feasibility studies for the first wave of pilot projects for the initiative (e.g. carbon revenue, reforestation costs, etc) and develop different scenarios with respect to the risks related to the performance of the carbon projects.
- Technical: Coordinate feasibility studies and country selection with the technical support from colleagues in the Division of Resilience and Solutions (DRS), colleagues in the relevant Country Operations (COs), and counterparts at the DB partner, incl. procuring companies or consultants running the feasibility studies; Support coordination and oversight of project implementation in close collaboration with the DB partner, and DRS, Legal Affairs Service (LAS), and CO colleagues; Support Monitoring and Evaluation of REP Fund projects once they begin implementation.
- On the administrative side: Support fundraising by DRRM (Donor Relations and Resource Mobilization) and PSP (Private Sector Partnerships); work with DSPR (Division of Strategic Planning and Results) to manage relevant budget procedures
- Partnership: support management of the partnership with the DB partner, including coordination on technical design and feasibility studies; coordination with LAS colleagues on management of legal agreements; and work with DSPR to manage relevant Partnership Agreements with the DB partner
- Create and regularly update annual workplan and ongoing project workplan to assist with the management, coordination, and delivery of the REP Fund initiative.
- Regularly track progress against the workplan, raising interdependencies and risks to project delivery to supervisors. It will involve being in close touch with the DB partner, participating offices, sub-offices, relevant regional and HQ colleagues to ensure sustained progress against project objectives and milestones.
- Create draft agendas and support materials for internal meetings, facilitating meetings as needed, and helping ensure timely follow-ups.
- Prepare for internal Steering Committee (“UNHCR SteerCo”) and joint DB-UNHCR Steering Committee (“External SteerCo” – to be set up) meetings and help ensure overall stakeholder management, including drafting meeting materials for UNHCR and External SteerCo meetings and helping to ensure overall meeting effectiveness and timely decision-making, as well as finalizing documents with the feedback of the supervisor and other key stakeholders. This also includes helping to ensure that meeting set-up occurs in a timely and streamlined way, relevant senior leadership are briefed properly in advance of meetings, well-written notes are circulated after the meeting, and action points are tracked and executed accordingly.
- Help coordinate involvement of external actors incl. donors, governments, other UN agencies, local and international partners, carbon project developers, and implementing partners.
- Report to donors in line with our grant agreements for this project and provide ad hoc updates per request.
- Development and regular updating of the REP Fund financial model for selected countries
- Support COs and field staff in facilitating REP Fund project implementation
- Annual workplan and targets agreed with UNHCR SteerCo and External SteerCo, and delivery against those targets.
- Grant reports and deliverables for donors.
- Positive representation of UNHCR’s REP Fund initiative and overall greening initiatives/activities to external parties including donors and other stakeholders.
- Coordinate and convene meetings with DB partner, COs, and technical staff to plan and execute implementation of REP Fund projects.
- Coordinate and convene internal meetings with cross-functional group of colleagues that provide financial, technical, and administrative input into the REP Fund initiative
- Engage existing and potential new funders to contribute to the REP Fund.

Essential Minimum Qualifications and Professional Experience Required

- Minimum 6 years relevant experience with Undergraduate degree; or 5 years relevant experience with Graduate degree; or 4 years relevant experience with Doctorate degree in management consulting or auditor/consulting firm; investment firm or social enterprise with energy and/or environment focus; legal firm working directly on project finance, energy, and/or environment-related topics; or UN/humanitarian/development agency working directly on energy and/or environment projects.
- A first level university degree in Finance, Accounting, Business Administration, energy/environment /engineering, or other related field. Masters/graduate degree in related field a plus.
- Experience working in humanitarian or global development settings, and/or for the UN or other humanitarian/development agencies preferred.

Required competencies:

- Experience independently managing complex, multi-stakeholder projects
- Experience independently building and evaluating financial models
- Experience in the energy and/or environment sector
- Business analysis / business case development ability, including demonstrated experience doing business case development in development, humanitarian, or social enterprise settings
- Excellent interpersonal skills, including formal and informal influencing skills and ability to connect with a wide variety of actors, including private sector, investors, development and humanitarian actors, technical experts, and field-based staff
- Capacity to manage multiple stakeholders, an aptitude for formal and informal networking; and to build trust with internal and external partners
- Ability to thrive in a team environment, and to work within an international multi-cultural team
- Solid organizational skills and ability to multi-task
- Solid ability to plan against objectives and to make strategic decisions without heavy supervision
- Excellent communication skills both written and verbal targeting different audiences, as well as excellent negotiation and presentation skills
- Excellent computer skills (MS Office, SharePoint, PeopleSoft, BI tools, etc.) and awareness of digital technologies
- Ability to manage a stressful work environment
- Ability to establish and meet or exceed targets, and keep in track with objectives.
- Results-oriented mentality with a commitment to continuous learning

Desirable competencies:

- Experience in the private sector, especially in management consulting, investment banking, private equity, and/or project management
- Experience in fragile/developing country contexts or in field locations
- Good understanding of environmental context, particularly with respect to carbon finance, and reforestation and cooking energy requirements, in humanitarian settings
- Expertise in planning, formulation, implementation, monitoring, evaluating and reporting on humanitarian-development programs.

This temporary job opportunity is with possibility of extension beyond Dec 31, 2024.

Functional Clearance

This position doesn't require a functional clearance

Required languages (expected Overall ability is at least B2 level)

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Desired languages

English

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Additional Qualifications

EC-Economic and financial forecasting, ER-Development Financing/Development Planning, MG-Business Performance Analysis and Management, MG-Stakeholder Management, MG-Strategy Development and Implementation, PG-Strategic analysis, PG-Work-planning and programme management, PS-Data analytics and business intelligence for private sector partnershipsBachelor of Arts (BA): Accounting (Required), Bachelor of Arts (BA): Business Administration (Required), Bachelor of Arts (BA): Development Economics (Required), Bachelor of Arts (BA): Economics (Required), Bachelor of Arts (BA): Finance (Required)

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