Consultant Programme Policy

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNMENT

For more than 50 years, WFP has been the leading organization in supporting countries with school feeding. WFP provides school meals to more than 16 million schoolchildren, as well as technical assistance to governments to strengthen national programmes embedded in national education policies. WFP launched in January 2020 a ten-year strategy that lays out its vision of working with governments and partners to jointly ensure that all primary schoolchildren have access to quality meals in school, accompanied by a broader integrated package of health and nutrition services.

In July 2019, UNESCO and WFP convened an inter-agency meeting on School Health, which gathered UNICEF, WHO, FAO, UNESCO, WFP, GPE and WB to determine a renewed joint approach to promoting school health, including school feeding, to strengthen education outcomes. Unanimously, Agencies agreed that more needed to be done in the area of school health and nutrition- so far, a neglected area- and that UN agencies needed to do it jointly. Follow-up actions emerged along four areas: Joint advocacy; Data and knowledge sharing; Coordinated policy advice and capacity strengthening engagement at the country level; and Coordinated work on standards.

In October 2019, WFP has devoted a staff member part time to support the implementation of these actions. All partner organizations have increasingly positioned school health in their advocacy and partnership work, especially in the context of the response to the COVID-19 outbreak.

This consultancy is a continuation of these efforts and contributes to WFP School Feeding Strategy Workstream 2: "Acting in partnership to improve and advocate for school health. Under the overall supervision of the Head of the School Meals Coalition Secretariat, the consultant will support efforts to better position and step-up joint action on School Health and Nutrition, by coordinating and taking forward the inter-agency partnership initiated in 2019, and ensuring the follow-up of agreed joint actions.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

1. Coordinating, supporting, and developing the work of the SHN interagency partnership "Stepping Up Effective School Health and Nutrition"

• Developing the inter-agency partnership and facilitating timely exchange of information and coordination of joint products, by:

  • Reviewing jointly the objectives of the inter-agency group, considering related partnership initiatives such as the School meals coalition, the HPS initiative and the Global Education Coalition
  • Convening regular virtual or face-to face meetings (3-4), as deemed relevant and possible
  • Updating regularly partners (e.g. "update email" every second month)
  • Intensification of bilateral discussions and engagement with partners to ensure we are fully building on partner assets and contributions, during periods between meetings

• Coordinating joint/aligned advocacy efforts to further position school health and nutrition, by:

  • identifying key advocacy opportunities and coordinating the update of a common narrative and materials, with a focus on further positioning school health in the education agenda
  • Supporting partners' advocacy efforts (e.g. messages coordinated for specific events)
  • Keeping a reference calendar to guide actions, with identified advocacy opportunities

• Shifting from a reactive and opportunistic advocacy strategy, to a more proactive approach with longer lead time and prioritization of actions that will have the most impact

• Managing the development of a first Global report on the State of School Health and Nutrition, to serve as a reference to track progress and support policy dialogue

  • Ensuring the overall management and quality and timely progress in the development of the report
  • Contracting, project-managing and providing guidance to consultants /companies contributing the development of the report (e.g. compilation and analysis of data available; drafting of the report)
  • Coordinating inputs and peer review from partners and experts, through feed-back & validation meetings and other mechanisms
  • Ensuring quality assurance and contributing to the data analysis and crafting key messages and recommendations
  • Coordinating publishing and launch activities, in close collaboration with the section's communication officer and partners

2. Further developing UNESCO/WFP partnership on School Health and Nutrition

and supporting joint efforts to position the issue in the education agenda

• Supporting the implementation of the MoU between the two agencies and act as technical focal point in UNESCO for WFP. Activities include, among others, supporting regular dialogue at senior and technical levels between WFP and UNESCO; and facilitating joint efforts and working the Education 2030 team to ensure learners health, nutrition and well being are addressed in global dialogues, agenda and cooperation mechanisms for education.

• Providing support to WFP staff in their partnership initiatives with UNESCO.

3. Supporting UNESCO Health and Education Section work on school health

• Providing inputs to the work of the Health and Education team—this may include, among others, inputs to the development of UNESCO's forthcoming new strategy for Health and Education, donor proposals, and other documents with school health and nutrition components; supporting the roll-out of Health-Promoting Schools Global Standards at the country level; and supporting UNESCO's school health M&E work.

4. Any other tasks required by the Unit