Gender Based Violence Information Management Officer, P3, Port Sudan/Khartoum

Background:

On April 15th, 2023, military conflict erupted between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The conflict started in Khartoum State and quickly spread to the States of West Darfur, South Darfur, North Darfur, South Kordofan, North Kordofan, Blue Nile, Kassala and the Red Sea. As of the date of this note, the conflict is still ongoing and, in some areas, it even intensifies.

The revised 2023 Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) for Sudan estimates that before the conflict, around 3.1 million women and girls and other vulnerable people were already facing the risk of life-threatening violence in Sudan, according to UN estimates in the initial 2023 Sudan HRP. Since the conflict broke out, that number has increased by 1 million, meaning 4.2 million people (including refugees inside Sudan) are at risk of gender-based violence (GBV) as violence continues, inter-communal tensions mount, and protection services and support systems are increasingly breaking down, and access to lifesaving services is heavily impacted by the ongoing conflict.

Women and girls continue to live at an extremely high risk of all forms of gender-based violence (GBV). The presence of armed actors, resource shortages -including water, food, and fuel - and even the humanitarian response itself continue to exacerbate the risk of GBV and sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) in the public sphere, while long periods trapped within homes due to fighting increase incidents of intimate partner and domestic violence. Multiple women and girls, including non-Sudanese individuals, are experiencing secondary displacement and psychological impacts of displacement. Older women, adolescent girls and women and girls living with disabilities face additional concerns and challenges in this unstable environment. Vulnerable men and boys are also exposed to the risks of GBV.

Ongoing insecurity, looting, and inability to ensure reliable supply chains for commodities, combined with electricity cuts and fuel shortages, all continue to prohibit the GBV humanitarian response on the scale necessary to meet the needs in conflict-affected states. While humanitarian actors, including coordination mechanisms, are now operating through locations including States affected by new IDP influx, such as Port Sudan and Al Jazeirah State, administrative challenges, shortages of supplies, and unmet needs for GBV services continue to exist.

UNFPA Sudan supports GBV interventions at two levels. It coordinates multi-sectoral and comprehensive partner interventions through the GBV sub-sector under the overall protection sector. UNFPA also implements specific prevention and response activities. Specifically, this includes coordination of comprehensive GBV-related prevention and response activities among different actors through chairing the GBV sub-sector under the protection sector to ensure comprehensive sharing of information, identification of response gaps, and follow-up through relevant protection stakeholders. UNFPA also supports the revision and operationalisation of already developed National Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). Programmatically, UNFPA conducts community sensitisation on GBV issues, supports women's centres providing entry points for livelihood opportunities, and provides personal hygiene/dignity kits to the most vulnerable women and adolescent girls of communities affected by humanitarian crises.

UNFPA leads the national GBV AoR under the Protection Sector (led by UNHCR) and works closely with UNICEF (Child Protection) and UNHCR (Protection) to ensure strong linkages between the sub-sector and the Protection sector. UNFPA currently also assumes the GBV coordination by leading 11 GBV sub-sector working groups (GBV WG) in 4 Darfur states (North, West, South, and Central), Blue Nile state, White Nile state, South Kordofan state, Kassala state, Gadarif state, Al Jazeira state, and Red Sea state.

The position:

In Sudan, UNFPA has a responsibility for leading the GBV AoR, called “GBV Sub-Sector”, under the Protection Cluster or for actively identifying and supporting another agency to take on this role. The incumbent will support UNFPA/GBV AoR in an inter-agency capacity to ensure a robust and well-functioning information management system for GBV response that promotes the highest standards of GBV ethical data management, in line with globalguidance.

The International GBV AoR Information Management Officer (IMO) will lead on a systematic, safe and ethical process of collecting, collating, storing, processing, verifying, analysing and disseminating data and information related to GBV and the sectoral response to enable evidence-based and quality GBV coordination and response. The GBV AoR IMO is also responsible for providing technical guidance, mentoring and coaching to strengthen the national GBV IM capacity.

IMO will use the GBV Area of Responsibility’s Handbook for Coordinating Gender-based Violence Interventions in Emergencies (2019), the Inter-Agency Minimum Standards for Prevention and Response to GBV in Emergencies and the IASC’s Guidelines for Integrating Gender-based Violence Interventions in Humanitarian Action: Reducing Risk, Promoting Resilience, and Aiding Recovery, to facilitate information management system strengthening.

How can you make the difference:

UNFPA is the lead UN agency for delivering a world where every pregnancy is wanted, every childbirth is safe, and every young person's potential is fulfilled. UNFPA’s strategic plan (2022- 2025) reaffirms the relevance of the current strategic direction of UNFPA and focuses on three transformative results: to end preventable maternal deaths; end unmet need for family planning; and end gender-based violence and harmful practices. These results capture our strategic commitments on accelerating progress towards realizing the ICPD and SDGs in the Decade of Action leading up to 2030. Our strategic plan calls upon UN Member States, organizations and individuals to “build forward better”, while addressing the negative impacts of the conflict on women’s and girls’ access to sexual and reproductive health and gender-based violence services.

In a world where fundamental human rights are at risk, we need principled and ethical staff who embody these international norms and standards, and who will defend them courageously and with full conviction.

UNFPA is seeking candidates who transform, inspire and deliver high impact and sustained results; we need staff who are committed, principled, uphold the highest sense of integrity and are exceptional in how they manage the resources entrusted to them.

You would be responsible for:

Under the direct supervision of the GBV AoR Coordinator, the international GBV IM Officer will provide technical support to ensure that up-to-date information necessary for effective GBV programming and coordination is collected, used, stored and shared, in line with relevant standards. IMO will support the GBV AoR to make informed, evidence-based strategic and programmatic decisions for GBV programming based on the collected and analysed information on the scale/scope and coverage of the GBV responses at the state level and the needs of affected populations. The GBV IM officer will provide technical guidance, mentoring, and coaching to the national GBV IMO and collaborate closely with the GBV AoR Coordinator at the national level.

Support Coordination and Service Delivery

• In consultation with the GBV AOR partners, develop/update the IM strategy, which defines how data is collected, collated, analysed and shared and the ethical and safety standards in GBV data management.
• Conduct mapping of all actors (national and international organizations as well as local community-based institutions) working on GBV prevention and response using the 4Ws matrix.
• Conduct periodic mapping of multi-sectoral GBV service providers and existing and potential referral mechanisms, identifying details of the specific types of response services (entry points), their locations, service providers’ contact details to establish/update/strengthen referral pathways for GBV survivors.
• Conduct analysis of the service mapping data to identify key gaps in terms of availability, accessibility, quality of services, as well as issues of duplication to assist the GBV AOR coordination in developing mechanisms to address them.
• Manage information flows and dissemination in a timely and appropriate way, including up-to-date contact/mailing lists, shared information repositories (such as Google Drive, drop box), a humanitarian website and other platforms.
• Support GBVIMS roll-out in designated states.
• Organise and maintain safe and accessible systems for the exchange of information about GBV standards/guidelines, assessments, resource mobilization processes and coordination.
• Represent the GBV AOR in the Information Management Working Group (IMWG) meetings, and work with relevant clusters, including protection (led by UNHCR), child protection (led by UNICEF), the Inter-Cluster
• Coordination Group (led by OCHA), health (led by WHO) and relevant stakeholders (national and international NGOs and community-based organisations) to exchange and analyse relevant information.
• Support the GBV AOR partners in applying GBV guiding principles (safety, non- discrimination, confidentiality and informed consent) as keystones of safe and ethical data management, including not seeking or disclosing unauthorized information that could be misconceived as prevalence of GBV
• Contribute to advocacy and communication materials (key messaging/briefing note/talking points, etc.) developed by the GBV AOR to help a better understanding of the GBV needs due to the humanitarian crisis, as well as the gap in the response and financial requirements.

Capacity Building

• Provide technical guidance, mentoring and coaching to the national GBV AoR members
• Conduct periodic capacity building surveys among the GBV AOR partners to assess the level of partners’ capacity in different relevant thematic areas (including IM), identify capacity building/training needs and map out existing initiatives and resources.
• Facilitate IM capacity building support to the GBV AoR partners to ensure timely and quality data collection, storage, analysis, dissemination and usage in line with relevant safety and ethical guidelines. (e.g. training, one-to-one support, learning sessions during GBV AOR meetings, refresher sessions, etc.)
• Develop/update guidance note on the GBV AoR 4W monitoring tool, including response indicators definition and how to use the tool.

Needs Analysis, Strategic Decisions, and Response Planning

• Identify/update the GBV AOR information needs and appropriate methods/available data sources to facilitate informed strategic decisions and effective response planning.
• Ensure GBV specific indicators and questions are adequately and appropriately integrated in the existing and new inter-agency assessments including Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM), Site Assessment (SA), protection monitoring, etc.
• Map out and review available qualitative and quantitative secondary data sources to assist the GBV needs analysis and identify information gaps.
• Participate in relevant GBV-related assessments/data gathering initiatives to provide direct technical support on the GBV in emergency assessment methodologies and the ethical considerations based on the
• WHO Ethical and safety recommendations for researching, documenting and monitoring sexual violence in emergencies
• Support review and adaptation of the GBV rapid assessment tools to ensure coherent and quality use of common assessment tools amongst partners.
• Consolidate and analyse information/data on the GBV-related needs, vulnerability and capacities of the population affected by the crisis from secondary data review, existing multi-sectoral assessments, DTM, GBV response monitoring data, and GBV- specific assessment.
• Support the GBV AOR in conducting analysis of the severity of needs and calculating the number of people in need (PiN) of GBV response, and setting realistic and measurable targets for priority activities and locations.
• Represent the GBV AOR in a joint intersectoral needs analysis team/working group.

Reposnse Monitoring and Reporting

• Support the GBV AOR in developing/revising its response monitoring plan; setting up appropriate indicators and measurements; and establishing/strengthening effective data management tools and systems for tracking progress against response targets.
• Work with the GBV AOR partners to maintain timely monitoring and reporting practices to update achievements and gaps in activity implementation/service delivery.
• Collect, compile and clean the weekly GBV 4W data and share with the relevant partners, including the protection cluster and OCHA.
• Based on analysis of the GBV 4W and other response monitoring tools, prepare and share with the protection cluster and OCHA the GBV AOR’s updates/inputs for the periodic humanitarian situation report and response monitoring dashboard.
• Develop and disseminate regular information management products such as dashboards and maps to visualize analysis of the GBV response activities’ coverage, gaps, overlaps and the progress against the humanitarian response plan targets.
• Provide regular presentations/briefings on the IM products and data analysis during the GBV AOR coordination meetings.

Programme Support

• Provide accurate, complete and up-to-date information for effective budget preparation, programme and project design, implementation, management and evaluation purposes.
• Support quality data collection on GBV by implementing partners for the UNFPA programme monitoring
• Support the GBV team to liaise with other external stakeholders on data collection in humanitarian settings if needed
• Ensure use of the most updated and innovative digital tools, including the use of AI, while abiding by rules and regulations and high standards of data protection required by the United Nations.

Qualifications and Experience:

Education:

Advanced University Degree in computer/data science, statistics, GIS, demography, economics or the equivalent combination of education and experience in a related area.

Knowledge and Experience:

• Minimum 5 years of relevant professional experience in areas relevant to Information Management, analysis, and needs assessments. Required demonstrable professional experience in the area of Gender-Based Violence Information Management linked to Sub-Sector coordination.
• Required in-depth understanding of current challenges surrounding global tools and guidance on GBV Information Management, in particular processes surrounding the HNO/HRP and inter-agency IM work streams.
• Effectively uses quantitative and qualitative analysis as well as visualization methods, software and ability to produce and disseminate regular IM products tailored to appropriate audiences.

Demonstrated skills in communication, training and mentoring to GBV and non- GBV specialists in GBV IM standards and principles.

Languages:

Proficiency in both oral and written English is required; knowledge of Arabic is an asset

Required Competencies:

Values:

• Exemplifying integrity,
• Demonstrating commitment to UNFPA and the UN system,
• Embracing cultural diversity,
• Embracing change

Core Competencies:

• Achieving results,
• Being accountable,
• Developing and applying professional expertise/business acumen,
• Thinking analytically and strategically,
• Working in teams/managing ourselves and our relationships,

Functional Competencies:

• Advocacy / Advancing a policy-oriented agenda, leveraging the resources of state/local governments and partners/building strategic alliances and partnerships.
• Delivering results-based programmes;
• Internal and external communication and advocacy for results mobilization.
• Project management leadership

Compensation and Benefits:

This position offers an attractive remuneration package including a competitive net salary plus health insurance and other benefits as applicable.

Disclaimer:

Selection and appointment may be subject to background and reference checks, medical clearance, visa issuance and other administrative requirements.

UNFPA does not charge any application, processing, training, interviewing, testing or other fee in connection with the application or recruitment process and does not concern itself with information on applicants' bank accounts.

Applicants for positions in the international Professional and higher categories, who hold permanent resident status in a country other than their country of nationality, may be required to renounce such status upon their appointment.

Same Posting Description for Internal and External Candidates