M&E Assistant

Expertise France (EF) is the French public agency for international technical assistance. The agency provides partner countries with knowledge, skills and management expertise in:

• Democratic, economic, and financial governance,
• Stability, international security and peace,
• Sustainable development, climate and agriculture,
• Health and human development.

Expertise France designs and implements cooperation projects addressing skills transfers between professionals. The agency also develops integrated offers, assembling public and private expertise in order to respond to the partner countries' needs.

With a business volume of 192 million Euros, a portfolio of over 500 projects in 100 countries, and 63,000 days of expert missions every year, Expertise France promotes French and European development policy goals.

Context

The Middle East is currently experiencing a profound crisis. The conflicts in Syria and Iraq are both a reflection and a transmitter of this crisis, with growing potential to further destabilize neighbouring countries and the wider region. These crises have resulted in a humanitarian disaster affecting more than 13.5 million people who were forced to flee their homes from Syria, and more than 17 million people in need of humanitarian aid (12.2 in Syria and 5.2 in Iraq).

Lebanon is now home to the largest number of Syrian refugees per capita relative to its total population, putting a severe strain on the country’s fragile infrastructures, economy, and security. The population of Lebanon was estimated at about 4.8 million (including almost half a million Palestinian refugees) in 2013. Even though Lebanon has not signed the 1951 Refugee Convention, it has taken in up to now about a fourth of its own population. According to UNHCR, in September 2016 about 1,017,433 persons from Syria were registered as refugees in Lebanon.  In the Lebanon Crisis Response Plan 2017- 2020 (2018 update) (LCRP), the total number of people living in Lebanon is estimated at 5.9 million, with 3.3 million people in need. 

The severe social, economic, financial, and monetary crises Lebanon has been going through since 2019, compounded by the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, have severely affected hundreds of thousands of people, irrespective of their nationality.

Stabilization and resilience background

The “Peace, Stability and Security” unit runs 2 projects in Lebanon: QUDRA and SHABAKE.

1. QUDRA

’Qudra – Resilience for Syrian refugees, IDPs and host communities in response to the Syrian and Iraqi crises’ is a regional action co-financed by the EU Regional Trust Fund in Response to the Syrian Crisis, the Madad Fund, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), and the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) seeking to strengthen the resilience of Syrian refugees, IDPs and host communities in response to the Syrian and Iraqi crises. The Programme launched in June 2016 has been jointly implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, Expertise France (EF) and AECID in Programme partner countries of Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey and North Iraq.

In Lebanon, EF implemented Qudra between 2016 and 2019 in close collaboration with the Ministry of Social Affairs (MoSA). Currently, the two partners are implementing Qudra 2, another three-year Programme, with a continuation of activities to be delivered in selected Social Development Centres (SDCs) and/or through Mobile Units. The project seeks to improve social stability among communities in Lebanon through a comprehensive and local approach of protection for children and adults. To do so, activities revolve around four pillars: (i) support to SDCs under MoSA, (ii) Child Protection activities, (iii) Protection activities and (iv) campaigns and communication activities. The activities are implemented in partnership between seven local NGOs and 14 SDCs within the framework of the Lebanon Crisis Response Plan and MoSA Strategic Plan on the Protection of Women and Children. In addition, Qudra 2 also aims to further develop the capacity of MoSA and SDC staff through training, coaching and on-the-job learning.

2. SHABAKE

The Shabake project is funded by Agence Francaise de Development (AFD) co funded by DANIDA (Danish cooperation agency)., is a 3 years (2019-2022) project designed withing the framework of the localization of aid agenda and the need to strengthen Lebanese NGOs capacities.

The project aims to help local and international Lebanese non-governmental organizations (NGOs) become lasting, key players in mitigating and ameliorating the effects of the Syrian refugee crisis on Lebanon and the subsequent crises that have emerged in the current context in Lebanon, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the Beirut Port Explosions.

The NGO partners selected for the Shabake project are comprised of 13 local NGOs, each of whom will receive support in developing their organizational and technical capacities. They will also have an opportunity to put their new institutional changes into practice via a humanitarian project that reduce vulnerabilities and Economic Recovery projects that will improve the economic wellbeing of businesses in the Beirut blast area. In addition, each NGO partner will be invited to meet and directly interact with donors, aid providers, and public authorities working in the development-aid ecosystem. 

To this end, the Shabake capacity-reinforcement project is divided in four main component parts:

1. Building on the strengths, assets, capacities, and skills of the local Lebanese NGOs
2. Having each NGO partner implement a crisis-response project to reduce vulnerabilities.
3. Improving and/or integrating the participation of NGO partners in the development-aid ecosystem.
4. Local NGO partners have designed and implemented innovative economic recovery and livelihood projects post the Beirut Port Explosions.

* The Expertise France office in Lebanon currently implements 4 other projects, outside the scope of this position.

1. Assignment:

Expertise France is looking to hire a temporary Monitoring & Evaluation Assistant to support in the monitoring tasks of the Qudra  and Shabake projects.  

A full-time contract for the period of 6 months.

The M&E will be responsible for delivering the tasks within the below defined scope of work in close collaboration with the M&E Officer.

This Vacancy of M&E Assistant is based in Beirut, within Expertise France premises.

Responsibility 1:

• Revision and verification of all submitted supporting documents.
• Ensuring accuracy, clarity, and completeness of all submitted supporting documents.
• Cross-checking partners indicator tracking tools with the online folders to identify missing documents and missing details and raising issues with the relevant partners’ staff.
• Write a progress update report on the partners supporting documents.
• Any other task relevant to following up on monitoring tools and supporting documents.

Responsibility 2:

• Plan and prepare for end-of-cycle qualitative assessments with the partners’ focal points.
• Administer qualitative tools on the field with beneficiaries if the situation allows (when data collection is due, if implementation of activities is ongoing on the field, data collection will take place on the field as well, if not, then data collection will take place remotely).

Responsibility 3:

• Provide day to day data quality verification.
• Undertake field visits when needed in order to support data collection or verify data quality.
• Maintain and update the filing systems.
• Provide support in compiling data to measure the progress and impact of the project’s activities.
• Assess, discuss and address M&E challenges with the supervisor.
• Perform other M&E duties as required or assigned.

2.  Technical Skills, Experience and Knowledge:

Education Level

Relevant university degree in social science, political science, public health, or any other relevant field.

Qualifications

• At least 1 year of relevant experience in a relevant field (humanitarian experience, research, monitoring and evaluation, etc.)
• Experience collecting quantitative and qualitative data from different stakeholders.
• Knowledge of the Lebanese civil society and the Lebanese aid ecosystem in general.
• Excellent computer skills: MS Windows and MS Office packages (Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Outlook).

Personal Qualities

• Good communication and reporting skills.
• Good interpersonal  skills and ability to work effectively with local stakeholders.
• Proactive, results-oriented, and service-oriented.

Languages

• Fluency in English is required and Arabic (written and spoken).
• Knowledge of French is desirable.

3. application

Please send your CV and cover letter to:  info-shabake@expertisefrance.fr

4. Salary and Special Notice

Monthly Salary upon EF salary Scale – Fresh USD

While the temporary assignment may provide the successful applicant with an opportunity to gain new work experience, the selection for this position is for a limited period and has no bearing on the future incumbency of the post.

Please note that due to the ongoing situation with COVID- 19 the candidate may be required to start the assignment/consultancy remotely until further notice.