Climate and Resilience: Early Warning Awareness Intern

Background

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) is the world's largest humanitarian organization, with 192 member National Societies. As part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, our work is guided by seven fundamental principles; humanity, impartiality, neutrality, independence, voluntary service, unity and universality.

Organizational Context

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) is the world’s largest humanitarian organization, with a network of 192-member National Societies. The overall aim of the IFRC is “to inspire, encourage, facilitate, and promote at all times all forms of humanitarian activities by National Societies with a view to preventing and alleviating human suffering and thereby contributing to the maintenance and promotion of human dignity and peace in the world.” The IFRC works to meet the needs and improve the lives of vulnerable people before, during and after disasters, health emergencies and other crises. The IFRC is part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement (Movement), together with its member National Societies and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). The work of the IFRC is guided by the following fundamental principles: humanity, impartiality, neutrality, independence, voluntary service, unity, and universality. The IFRC is led by its Secretary General, and has its Headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. The Headquarters are organized into three main Divisions: (i) National Society Development and Operations Coordination; (ii) Global Relations, Humanitarian Diplomacy and Digitalization; and (iii) Management Policy, Strategy and Corporate Services. The IFRC Middle East and North Africa (MENA) regional office based in Beirut, Lebanon supports 17 national societies in the region. The MENA Disasters, Climate, and Crises – DCC (prevention, response and recovery) unit within the MENA regional office works with one regional plan as well as provides the technical support & quality assurance to country cluster support teams and country offices. The MENA DCC (PRR) unit has articulated its alignment with the strategic priorities and enablers in-line with the global IFRC Strategy 2030 and IFRC’s Plan and Budget 2021-2025.

Job Purpose

Climate change is a humanitarian emergency, threatening human survival now and in the long term. The frequency and severity of extreme weather events have increased and will continue to do so, together with more uncertainty. Meanwhile, longer-term impacts of climate change, such as rising temperatures, sea level rise, growing desertification, biodiversity loss and environmental degradation, are increasingly being felt. 

Disaster risk reduction has been one of IFRC’s key focus areas over the past three decades. Today, IFRC is one of the biggest DRR actors in the world.

Over the coming years, in line with Strategy 2030, the Movement Ambitions to Address the Climate Crisis and our pledge made at the 33rd International Conference, the IFRC Secretariat will seek to mobilize a significant scale-up in climate action focused on reducing the current and future humanitarian impacts of climate and environmental crises through increasing our work on climate adaptation and mitigation and integrating climate and environmental risk management across our programmes, operations and advocacy.

In the MENA region, we continue to face many climate and environmental challenges which include water scarcity, extreme heat waves, air pollution, inadequate waste management, arable land depletion, desertification, loss of biodiversity, declining marine resources and degradation of coastal ecosystems.

MENA countries are very vulnerable to climate change impacts as harsh climate conditions, extremely high temperatures and heatwaves, limited groundwater, rainfall, and scarce agricultural and arable land naturally affect them. The region has been subject to an almost continuous drought since 1998, according to NASA, which says the current dry period is the worst for 900 years. The World Bank, which is spending $1.5 billion to fight climate change in the region, estimates that 80-100 million people will be exposed to water stress by 2025. 

Job Duties and Responsibilities

• To act as a focal point on the Risk Watch monitoring and alert system for MENA region.
• To support the implementation of 2022 regional roadmap on Climate and resilience on:

Documentation on Climate and Resilience, Climate and Resilience awareness.

Act as a focal point on the Risk Watch exercise for MENA region:

• Monitor alerts daily and produce report alerts integrated in early warning system with the MENA national societies.
• Prepare the monthly Risk Watch presentation and report for the Monthly risk watch meeting with EOC Geneva.
• Elaborate a plan to assess the scope of risk alert from the MENA office to country offices and communities.
• Promote climate related science and practice links, including the Early Warning-Early Action approach.

Lead the Climate and Resilience documentation:

• Document progress building on the baseline study on climate and resilience landscape, priorities, and opportunities in the MENA region.
• Follow data collection, organization and monitoring systems ensuring that high quality standards are maintained.
• Map out best practices, case studies and lessons learned relating to climate change, eco-DRR, NBS and resilience building both internally (RCRC) and externally.
• Support the production of a position paper on the impact of the climate change on the humanitarian situation in the region and the proposed scope and role of the RCRC reducing, preparing and addressing these impacts.

Act as a focal point on Climate and Resilience awareness:

• Produce awareness materials for campaigns to increase public understanding of environmental and climate-related issues.
• Assist in the development of a Climate and environmental issues curriculum for NSs to recruit and train Climate Change Adaptation volunteers to undertake awareness actions.
• Support the organization and facilitation of the Y-Adapt Training of Facilitators.

Support the DCC unit on specific administrative tasks:

• Support the DCC team on specific administrative task upon request.

Other tasks:

• Support in dialogues related to climate smart resilience.
• Support in the planning of the activities together with the Climate and Resilience team.
• Support the development of project proposals for Disaster Risk Management and Climate Action toward to increase the Resilience of communities, and establish appropriate planning, monitoring, and reporting procedures.
• Support IFRC MENA Climate & Resilience Coordinator in any other tasks, including capacity development, etc...

Collaboration modalities:

• IFRC MENA Disasters, Climate and Crises Unit, Climate and Resilience Coordinator will take on the role as main responsible for the intern and will provide remote supervision for the person.

Reporting line/management:

• The intern formally reports to the IFRC MENA Climate & Resilience Coordinator. However, he/she would be expected to work most closely on a day-to-day basis with different unit members and regional technical counterparts among others.

Length of the assignment:

• The duration of the assignment will be 6 months, starting on 21st February 2022.

Education

• Engaged in a University degree in Environmental studies, Disaster Risk Reduction, Climate Change (or relevant area) - required

Experience

• Field experience in working with a humanitarian organization - preferred
• Experience working within the RC/RC Movement - preferred

Knowledge, skills and languages

• Excellent communication and writing skills - required
• Strong inter-personal and partnership building skills, demonstrated capacity to build functional networks - required
• Flexible and adaptable to work effectively in a multicultural environment and ability to travel at short notice - required

Languages

• Fluently spoken and written English - required
• Good command of another IFRC official language (Arabic) - preferred

Competencies and values

• Professionalism
• Communication
• Diversity
• Accountability
• Teamwork
• Integrity 

Comments

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.

The Federation is an equal opportunity employer.