NUTRITION REFERENT ADVISOR (BASED IN NAIROBI)

GENERAL CONTEXT

Médecins Sans Frontières is an international independent medical-humanitarian organization, which offers assistance to populations in distress, to victims of natural or man-made disasters and to victims of armed conflict, without discrimination and irrespective of race, religion, creed or political affiliation.

MSF is a civil society initiative that brings together individuals committed to the assistance of other human beings in crisis. As such MSF is by choice an association. Each individual working with MSF does it out of conviction and is ready to uphold the values and principles of MSF.

The MSF movement is built around six operational directorates. MSF OCBA is one of those directorates. The operations are implemented by field teams and the mission coordination teams; together with the organizational headquarter offices based in Barcelona, Nairobi, Dakar, Bogota and Amman. The field operations are guided and supported by 5 Operational Cells, the Emergency Unit and other departments supporting operations, including the Medical Department.

The Medical director is in charge of the overall management of the medical department with the support of the head of Med-Ops and an assistant. The technical advisors are divided in three groups of referent advisors of different specialties; mobile positions managed by the medical-operational unit are devoted to support the field program implementation and are under the management of the head of Med-Ops.

MAIN OBJECTIVE OF THE POSITION

S/he will contribute to define medical-nutritional interventions, strategies and protocols to implement quality nutritional programmes to treat acute malnutrition in different contexts of nutritional situations (food insecurity, crisis, etc.), and to design alternative models to tackle acute malnutrition (or other types of undernutrition) in contexts where malnutrition is endemic, recurrent or seasonal in coordination and collaboration with other staff(s) or referents involved.

The successful applicant will be based in Nairobi. The work will be carried out in the framework of the OCBA Strategic Orientations 2020 – 2023, the operational policy and OCBA annual plans as well as the Medical department plans, working in close collaboration with other technical advisors involved to contribute to a more transversal, integrated and holistic support to the polyvalent medical staff in the cells and the teams in the field and operations department in general at HQ level. S/he will be responding to the needs of OCBA missions.

MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES, FUNCTIONS AND TASKS

S/he is one of the two Nutrition Advisors providing support to field missions and cells polyvalent medical staff, concerning any technical problems/questions that arise from the field while implementing nutrition activities. Their overall responsibility will be to contribute through their expertise to the improvement of care of patients in MSF projects in the domain of nutrition. The two nutrition advisors cover specific missions. Nairobi Unit Nutrition advisor will normally provide support to East and Horn of Africa missions, although it will always be balanced among the two advisors and might be susceptible to change. The two nutrition advisors (Barcelona and Nairobi) will have specific topics that will be under the responsibility of each one (to be discussed according to the background of each advisor and current and potential future dossiers). Both advisors will work in close collaboration in the following responsibilities, functions and tasks described below:

Definition, follow-up and technical-strategic advice to the field projects

• S/he provides technical advice to define nutritional projects/programmes (his/her presence may be required at Project Committees for their approval).
• S/he supports defining nutritional activities, resources to fill the identified needs, when opening a new nutritional program, or when undertaking new nutrition-related activities within regular projects (e.g. support to TB, HIV, Chronical Care Units projects or others).
• S/he participates in the follow-up of nutritional projects/programmes and activities in support to medical-health advisor of the corresponding Operational Cell.
• S/he supports the teams in learning about the tools available in HMIS for collecting information on nutrition activities, their importance for monitoring and the use of indicators to improve the quality of care and support operational decisions.
• S/he supports the teams to improve quality of the care across all nutrition related programmes and activities focusing on improving identification of the needs, delivery of care and people centred approach.
• S/he provides periodic update on nutritional aspects and knowledge to Operational Cells staff and to other medical personnel when needed.
• S/he provides updated working tools to manage nutrition-related activities.
• S/he conduct field visits for nutritional assessments/surveys and/or to provide technical support to regular nutritional projects/programmes.
• S/he will brief and debrief field medical staff whose profiles include nutrition-related components, medical coordination team and occasionally to members of Operational Cells and Emergency Unit.
• S/he follows actively, monitors and evaluates the service provided by telemedicine.

Research and updated support for new strategic orientations for nutrition-related projects/programmes

• S/he participates in the production of technical working-tools for Nutrition and Food Security, in coordination with the MSF intersectional Nutrition Working Group (e.g. nutrition modules/guidelines, protocols, food security guidelines, and/or other intervention models (e.g. supplementary distributions or targeted distributions).
• S/he follows up early warning systems (FAO; Alertnet, FEWSNET, HJPN. etc) and disseminates the alerts to the Operational Cells.
• S/he in collaboration with the Epidemiologist advisor, support OCBA missions in interpreting the country’s information on food and nutritional security.
• S/he supports production of scientific articles or presentations within the nutrition framework.
• S/he participates in designing and follows up relevant operational research studies implemented at field level.
• S/he follows the evolution of innovation evidence-based advances in nutrition by following-up scientific publications, participating in international events and forums.
• S/he participates in networking with external partners and stakeholders in joint research projects, when relevant, and under the request of the Medical Director or his/her Head of Unit.
• S/he participates in the MSF intersectional Nutrition Working Group, and in other international platform or forums.

Training, communications-networking and representation of MSF

• S/he determines the training needs related to nutrition in collaboration with the Training Unit, and following the needs identified by Operations and Medical Departments.
• S/he participates as Facilitator–Trainer in sectional (OCBA) and international MSF courses that include nutrition components (MedCo course, PSP, Nut e-learning course, PPD etc.).
• S/he organizes and participates in conferences, congresses, workshops, forums, or nutrition meetings when requested by the Medical Director in coordination with the Nairobi Head of the Office.
• S/he participates, at the request of the HR Department, in the selection of people who are to carry out nutrition-related activities as well as their follow-up and evaluation.
• S/he supports the Communication Department when communicating on nutrition-related activities (interviews with press and other media).
• S/he participates in MSF magazines and leaflets when dealing with nutrition-related issues.
• S/he produces and distributes information relating to our programmes and specific issues.
• S/he is in charge of the internal and external circulation of certain documents or reports concerning our programmes (nutritional and mortality surveys, etc.).

Specificities to the Nairobi unit position

• Support the missions in the implementation of the nutrition security surveillance system in collaboration with the EPI advisor supporting the Operational Cell.
• Develop and maintain a professional network with relevant actors involved in the field of nutrition and medical research in Nairobi and in the region.
• Participate in relevant fora/events related to nutrition in Nairobi and the region and use those, when relevant, to disseminate medical activities outcomes.
• Liaise regularly with key relevant actors related to nutrition (academics, researchers, institution developing programs or policies related to nutrition) in Nairobi and within the region to inform or get informed on recent/ongoing development (programs, research, initiatives, introduction of new tools).
• Contribute to the development of partnerships with some institutions based in Nairobi.
• Participate as facilitator in some MSF trainings held in Nairobi (OCBA or Intersectional).
• Contribute to the Nairobi unit strategy.

SELECTION CRITERIA

• Medical Doctor with Nutrition postgraduate degree and/or experience, Nurse with nutrition postgraduate degree and/or experience or a Nutritionist.
• Minimum three years of field experience working in a nutrition program in developing countries with MSF or other humanitarian agencies and/or NGOs. Experience in emergency response is an asset.
• Experience in planning, implementing, analysing and diffusing nutritional assessments, evaluations, surveys (SMART) and respective mortality studies.
• Fluent in English. Good knowledge of French is an asset (and willingness to learn up to B2 level).
• Knowledge of another language (Spanish, Arabic, and Portuguese) is an asset.
• Good knowledge of East African networks is an asset.
• User skills of Excel, ENA for SMART surveys and NutVal.
• Availability to travel for two to three-weeks long visits to the field (approximate frequency: 4 times a year), including MSF international meetings.

CONDITIONS

• Position based in Nairobi (Kenya) at the Médecins Sans Frontières OCBA Nairobi Unit.
• Regular field visits (estimated to up to 30% of time).
• Full-time position.
• Contract duration: 6 months with possibility of extension.
• Annual gross salary: level HQ-4A – KES 3,465,673 (divided in 12 months payments) + secondary benefits, based on MSF OCBA reward policy.
• Starting date: ASAP.