Consultancy - Food Technologist (Food Safety Quality) - Level I, Islamabad

WFP encourages female candidates and people with disabilities to apply.

WFP seeks candidates of the highest integrity and professionalism who share our humanitarian principles. Selection of staff is made on a competitive basis. We are committed to promoting diversity and the principle of equal employment opportunity for all our employees and encourages qualified candidates to apply irrespective of religion or belief, ethnic or social background, gender, gender identity and disability.

ABOUT JOB

Job Title:  Food Technologist (Food Safety Quality)

Grade:    CST Level I                

Type of contract:  Regular Consultant                                            

Duration:  6 Months     

Duty Station: Islamabad, Pakistan

Vacancy Number:  168322

Date of Publication: 1st July, 2022

Deadline of Application: 19th July, 2022

This vacancy announcement is for Internationals only.

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

WFP offers a competitive benefits package including salary, pension, leave plus a medical insurance.
*Remote work if applicable or/FWA until return to office or travel is possible due to covid-19 restrictions.

JOB PURPOSE

Lead the implementation of food safety and quality management and/or food product optimisation initiatives within a Country Office or support regional or global initiatives. Job holders are responsible for partnering with the key supply chain functions to ensure an integrated supply chain approach to meeting the food assistance needs of beneficiaries.
Job holders have wide responsibilities and make significant contributions to ensure effective support to food safety and quality initiatives. To aid in the development and delivery of capacity strengthening tools to internal and external stakeholders thereby facilitating the adoption industry accepted codes of practice; and supporting food quality and safety management processes within WFP operations.

KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES (not all-inclusive)

1. Establish and implement protocols and tools relating to food technology issues, such as food safety and quality and food product optimisation, ensuring alignment with WFP procurement and supply chain strategy, policies and plans.
2. Review and provide advice on the procedures for mitigating and documenting food quality and safety issues e.g. during food transit and storage in warehouses.
3. Establish and implement protocols and tools in country offices that enable rapid response to situations with food safety concerns.
4. Create, manage and monitor food safety and quality system in country office.
a. Perform or supervise supplier audits on food safety and quality system accordance with WFP standards.
b. Perform or supervise technical evaluation to inspection and laboratory service providers to comply with WFP standards.
c. Monitor suppliers’, inspection and laboratory service providers’ performance and provide guidance or support to mitigate food safety risk when needed.
d. Review, analyze and provide advice on evidenced based recommendations prepared by junior staffs on control measures to mitigate and reduce food commodity losses and food quality and safety incidents for management decision.
e. Plan and monitor compliance tests.
5. Provide technical guidance and input to country office in the design and implementation of medium scale and/or relatively straight forward food assistance programmes, ensuring compliance with WFP food and safety regulations.
6. Lead and motivate a small team of staff, providing coaching, training and guidance as required to ensure appropriate development and enable high performance.
7. Build local capacity of WFP staff and external stakeholders on the key areas of food technology, such as quality control, food processing, loss prevention and mitigation, inspection and testing capacity.

8. Prepare accurate and timely reports that inform food risk assessment and management, and contribute to a WFP wide view of food technology activities, enabling informed decision making and consistency of information presented to stakeholders.
9. Build relationships and collaborate with counterparts in key supply chain functions to establish standard operation procedures, protocols and tools that maintain, monitor and verify food safety and quality along the WFP supply chain.
10. Build productive relationships and partnerships with counterparts in UN agencies, NGOs, governments and the private sector to enhance WFP capacity to respond effectively to levels of under nutrition.
11.Keep current on emerging developments and cutting edge research on the areas of food safety and quality and/or food product optimization in order to leverage the opportunities to incorporate industry best practices.
12. Act in an assigned emergency response capacity as required to meet emergency food assistance needs.
13. In the event of food safety incidents, carry out investigation exercises to enable lessons learned to be documented and shared, to reduce re-occurrence of the incident.
14.Other duty as required.

STANDARD MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

Education: Advanced university degree in Food Technology, Health Sciences, Food Control, Nutrition or other related field, or First University degree with an additional years of related work experience and/or training/courses.

Language: Fluency (level C) in English language. Intermediate knowledge (level B) of a second official UN language: Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, Spanish, and/or WFP’s working language, Portuguese.

DESIRED EXPERIENCES FOR ENTRY INTO THE ROLE

• Experience: 3-5 years.
• Experience working in both emergencies and development context.
• Familiarity with auditing schemes and auditor certification. FSSC22000 certified auditor is a plus.
• Familiarity of specialized nutritious foods, infant formula and food fortification.
• Has worked in emergency response capacity.
• Has worked with counterparts in supply chain function.
• Has experience monitoring and assessing food safety and quality issues.
• Implementing tools and protocols focused on safety and quality assurance.
• Has experience building strong external relationships.
• Has experience working on developing food assistance programmes.

ABOUT WFP

The World Food Programme (WFP) is the leading humanitarian organization saving lives and changing lives, delivering food assistance in emergencies and working with communities to improve nutrition and build resilience. WFP’s efforts focus on emergency assistance, relief and rehabilitation, development aid and special operations. Every day, WFP works worldwide to ensure that the poorest and most vulnerable, particularly women and children, can access the nutritious and safe food they need.

PAKISTAN COUNTRY OFFICE:
Following the takeover of Kabul on 15 August 2021 by the now de facto authorities and subsequent shift of control in the country, the humanitarian situation has continued to deteriorate. Afghanistan is becoming the world’s largest humanitarian crisis; 22.8 million people now face acute food insecurity according to the latest IPC assessment released on 25th October, including 8.7 million facing emergency levels of food insecurity (IPC phase 4). At the moment, the assessment indicates that above 22 million Afghans are food insecure and in need of food assistance and this is expected to be higher during winter seasons and in rural households.
WFP has never seen this many people facing emergency levels of food insecurity and WFP is ramping up its humanitarian support to meet the food and nutrition needs of almost 23 million people in Afghanistan. WFP aims to reach 12.5 million beneficiaries by April 2022, requiring over 149,000 MT of food on monthly basis. To achieve this, WFP expects operations may cost as much as US$ 220 million a month. To support this scale up, the Supply Chain corridor through Pakistan is critical to ensure the food needs of the people in Afghanistan are met.
Under the direct supervision of the Head of Supply Chain in Pakistan, the Food Technologist Consultant shall oversee primarily Food Safety and Quality activities in Pakistan for Afghanistan to ensure the smooth running of the key corridor from Pakistan to Afghanistan.

ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT

The post is for the Pakistan Country Office and reports to the Head of Supply Chain or the designate.

WFP is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce. WFP has zero tolerance for sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, abuse of authority or discrimination. All selected candidates will, undergo rigorous reference and background checks. 

No appointment under any kind of contract will be offered to members of the UN Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ), International Civil Service Commission (ICSC), FAO Finance Committee, WFP External Auditor, WFP Audit Committee, Joint Inspection Unit (JIU) and other similar bodies within the United Nations system with oversight responsibilities over WFP, both during their service and within three years of ceasing that service.