‘Youth in Work’ Gender & Livelihoods Expert

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS 4 July 2026-23:59-GMT+01:00 Central European Time (Rome) WFP celebrates and embraces diversity. It is committed to the principle of equal employment opportunity for all its employees and encourages qualified candidates to apply irrespective of race, colour, national origin, ethnic or social background, genetic information, gender, gender identity and/or expression, sexual orientation, religion or belief, HIV status or disability. ABOUT WFP The World Food Programme is the world’s largest humanitarian organization saving lives in emergencies and using food assistance to build a pathway to peace, stability and prosperity, for people recovering from conflict, disasters and the impact of climate change. At WFP, people are at the heart of everything we do and the vision of the future WFP workforce is one of diverse, committed, skilled, and high performing teams, selected on merit, operating in a healthy and inclusive work environment, living WFP's values (Integrity, Collaboration, Commitment, Humanity, and Inclusion) and working with partners to save and change the lives of those WFP serves. To learn more about WFP, visit our website: https://www.wfp.org and follow us on social media to keep up with our latest news: YouTube, LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok. WHY JOIN WFP? WFP is a 2020 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. WFP offers a highly inclusive, diverse, and multicultural working environment. WFP invests in the personal & professional development of its employees through a range of training, accreditation, coaching, mentorship, and other programs as well as through internal mobility opportunities. A career path in WFP provides an exciting opportunity to work across the various country, regional and global offices around the world, and with passionate colleagues who work tirelessly to ensure that effective humanitarian assistance reaches millions of people across the globe. We offer an attractive compensation package (please refer to the Terms and Conditions section of this vacancy announcement). JOB TITLE: ‘Youth in Work’ Gender & Livelihoods Expert TYPE OF CONTRACT: CST Level II UNIT/DIVISION: Climate and Resilience Service (PPGR) – Programme policy and Guidance (PPG) Division HQ DUTY STATION (City, Country): Remote with travel DURATION: Full-time, 11 monthsBACKGROUND AND PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNMENT: WFP is currently partnering with the Mastercard Foundation (the Foundation) for a fiveyear 130 million USD programme entitled ‘Strengthening food systems to promote increased value chain employment opportunities for youth’ (Youth in Work, YIW). This programme, which aims to strengthen local food systems and making them more efficient, sustainable, and inclusive for youth, in particular young women, will be implemented across eight countries in three different regions: East Africa (Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda); Southern Africa (Tanzania, Mozambique) and West Africa (Ghana, Nigeria, and Senegal). In each of these countries, the programme adopts an integrated value chain approach to implement context-specific interventions aimed at reaching the following outcomes:

• Young people, especially young women, have improved employment opportunities along the value chain
• Smallholder farmers, especially young women, increase the value of their sales, resulting in improved income
• Smallholder farmers, especially young women, reduce post-harvest losses and improve the quality of targeted crops
• Improved inclusiveness of marginalized groups in agricultural value chains
• Improved value chain efficiency for young people, in particular young women

The programme will focus on reducing post-harvest losses and increasing the access of small-holder farmers to reliable and remunerative market opportunities for a range of different crops. Importantly, the programme has a clear focus with targeted commitments on women and youth, with an emphasis on young women. As the Youth in Work programme enters its final year of implementation, there is an increased strategic focus on accelerating sustainable livelihoods outcomes for young women, increasing young women’s participation numbers in key countries, strengthening evidence related to women’s economic participation and income pathways, and demonstrating scalable approaches for inclusive food systems programming, in advance of potential future programme expansion. Furthermore, to prepare for a potential expansion, hands-on, evidence-based programmatic expertise on young women centered design and economic empowerment models will be needed within the Programme Coordination Team (PCT). To support these objectives, WFP requires highly specialized technical expertise to strengthen the integration of gender behaviour change approaches across YIW programming, with particular emphasis on addressing the social, household, institutional and market-level barriers that persistently constrain young women’s meaningful and sustained participation in agricultural livelihoods and value chains. Purpose of the position: The Gender & Livelihoods Expert will provide senior-level technical leadership and strategic accompaniment to Country Offices (COs) and the Programme Coordination Team (PCT) to strengthen programme quality, accelerate implementation progress related to women’s livelihoods outcomes, deepen behaviour change approaches for gender equality, strengthen learning and evidence generation, and support adaptive programming in response to emerging implementation findings. The role requires advanced expertise at the intersection of:

• gender equality and women’s economic empowerment;
• agricultural livelihoods and food systems programming;
• behaviour change for gender equality, including technical expertise and hands-on experience in engaging men for gender equality and women’s economic empowerment;
• youth livelihoods and market systems approaches;
• qualitative learning and assessment methodologies;
• adaptive programming;
• and multi-country technical accompaniment within complex development settings –based on proven country-based expertise.

ACCOUNTABILITIES/RESPONSIBILITIES: The Gender & Livelihoods Expert will serve as the lead technical expert supporting the integration of gender-responsive and in-depth gender behaviour change approaches across YIW programme activities, providing strategic technical leadership and hands-on coaching and accompaniment to all 8 Country Offices to strengthen women’s livelihoods outcomes across participating COs. The Expert will additionally support the development of practical guidance, tools, learning products and measurement approaches related to women’s economic empowerment, livelihoods outcomes and behaviour change for gender equality. Specific Responsibilities: Technical Leadership and Programme Acceleration

• Serve as the lead technical expert supporting integration of gender-responsive and gender behaviour change approaches across YIW livelihoods programming in all eight of the participating Country Offices.
• Provide strategic technical accompaniment to Country Offices to strengthen programme delivery models aimed at improving young women’s sustained participation, retention, progression and income generation within targeted agricultural value chains. Accompaniment needs to be anchored in hands-on, provenand concrete experience in designing and implementing gender responsive interventions.
• Support Country Offices to identify and address key social, household, institutional and market-level barriers affecting young women’s livelihoods outcomes, including constraints related to decision-making, unpaid care work, freedom of movement, control over income and productive assets, participation in markets, agency and social norms.
• Provide real-time technical guidance to support adaptive programming and implementation adjustments based on operational learning, monitoring data, qualitative insights and evolving implementation realities.
• Support accelerated implementation planning during the final phase of programme delivery to strengthen achievement of women’s livelihoods and country-level

participation targets across the YIW portfolio.

• Support Country Offices in strengthening the integration of women’s economic empowerment objectives across broader livelihoods, market systems and food systems programming interventions.

Behaviour Change and Community Engagement

• Lead on technical guidance and hands-on accompaniment for the design, adaptation and implementation of behaviour change approaches for gender equality aimed at strengthening women’s economic participation and livelihoods outcomes.
• Support Country Offices and cooperating partners to adapt and contextualize household and community-level engagement methodologies appropriate to agricultural livelihoods programming and diverse cultural contexts.
• Lead on the technical integration of approaches engaging men, households and community structures to strengthen enabling environments for women’s economic participation and decision-making.
• Support the strengthening of locally grounded implementation models that link behaviour change approaches directly with measurable livelihoods outcomes for young women.

Monitoring, Evaluation, Learning (MEL) and Evidence Generation

• Lead on technical guidance related to the measurement of gender equality and women’s livelihoods outcomes within YIW programming.
• Introduce new / support refinement of qualitative and quantitative tools and indicators to strengthen measurement of how gender-related barriers affect participation, income generation, productivity, retention and resilience outcomes for young women.
• Work closely with the Programme Coordination Team and MEL functions to strengthen aggregation and analysis of programme-level evidence related to women’s economic participation and livelihoods outcomes.
• Support Country Offices to strengthen collection and use of in-depth qualitative learning data to inform adaptive programming and strategic decision-making.
• Lead on gender-focused technical guidance for operational research, learning agendas, case studies, learning briefs and external-facing evidence products related to women’s economic empowerment and inclusive livelihoods programming.
• Provide technical accompaniment to IFPRI-led and other programme research processes related to gender equality, livelihoods and youth economic participation.

Capacity Strengthening and Technical Accompaniment

• Design and deliver advanced technical capacity strengthening support for Country Offices and cooperating partners on gender-responsive livelihoods programming, behaviour change for gender equality, women’s economic empowerment and inclusive implementation approaches.
• Provide ongoing coaching and technical accompaniment to programme teams to strengthen operationalization of gender-responsive programming approaches within value chain interventions, including field mission implementation support.
• Support Country Offices in the development and implementation of practical gender and livelihoods action plans aligned to programme objectives and operational

realities.

• Facilitate cross-country learning, documentation of good practices and exchange of operational learning across participating Country Offices.

Strategic Positioning and Partnership Support

• Support strategic positioning of YIW learning and evidence related to women’s livelihoods outcomes, youth employment and inclusive food systems programming.
• Contribute technical inputs to donor engagement processes, programme reviews, strategic reflection exercises and potential Phase II programme design discussions.
• Support identification and engagement of relevant technical partners, research institutions and implementing actors to strengthen programme quality and impact.
• Join regular meetings of the Programme Coordination Team and provide updates on progress, implementation challenges, emerging risks and opportunities for programme strengthening.

Supervision: The incumbent will work under the overall guidance of the Global Coordinator. QUALIFICATIONS & REQUIRED EXPERIENCE: Education Advanced university degree in Gender Studies, International Development, Agricultural Economics, Rural Development, Social Sciences, Development Studies or related field. Experience

• Minimum 10 years of experience in gender equality and women’s economic empowerment programming within international development contexts, with an emphasis on field-based experience.
• Proven technical and implementation experience integrating behaviour change approaches for gender equality within agricultural livelihoods, food systems, youth employment and market systems programming.
• Extensive hands-on experience designing, adapting and operationalizing behaviour change methodologies linked to women’s economic participation, livelihoods outcomes and engagement of men and households for gender equality.
• Strong experience providing technical accompaniment to multi-country programmes operating across complex and diverse implementation contexts.
• Expertise conducting qualitative gender and social norms analysis and translating findings into practical programme design, adaptation and implementation strategies.
• Experience leading qualitative and mixed-methods learning, operational research and evidence generation related to women’s economic empowerment, livelihoods and behaviour change processes.
• Experience strengthening measurement approaches related to women’s agency, participation, livelihoods outcomes, household dynamics and social norms change.
• Strong understanding of agricultural value chains, rural livelihoods systems and barriers affecting young women’s economic participation in food systems.
• Experience supporting donor-funded programmes with adaptive programming, learning and evidence-generation components is highly desirable.
• Experience working across resilience-focused and/or humanitarian-development nexus programming is highly desirable.
• Experience working with UN agencies and large-scale multi-country partnerships is strongly preferred.
• Familiarity with East, West and Southern African programming contexts is highly desirable.

Knowledge and Skills

• Advanced technical expertise in gender equality and women’s economic empowerment within agricultural livelihoods, food systems and youth employment programming.
• Demonstrated hands-on experience designing, adapting and implementing behaviour change models for gender equality and women’s economic participation, including development of curricula, facilitation tools and community engagement frameworks.
• Demonstrated understanding of how social norms, household dynamics, unpaid care, mobility and control over assets impact women’s livelihoods outcomes and participation in value chains.
• Demonstrated ability to translate gender analysis and operational learning into practical programme adaptation and implementation guidance.
• Demonstrated technical knowledge of qualitative and mixed-methods approaches for measuring women’s economic empowerment, livelihoods outcomes and behaviour change processes.
• Proven facilitation, capacity strengthening and technical accompaniment skills across multi-country and multicultural implementation contexts with a focus on gender behaviour change capacity building with CO staff and cooperating partners.
• Demonstrated analytical, communication and synthesis skills, including development of technical guidance, learning products and donor-facing documentation.
• Demonstrated knowledge of UN system gender equality frameworks and programming approaches.

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