Climate Investment Programs Advisor

Job Highlight

This is an excellent opportunity to contribute to Rwanda's climate action agenda by mobilizing finance for climate action. The position offers exposure to high-profile climate investment planning, cross-sectoral coordination, and engagement with development partners within the climate change space.

About The Project Office

WEC Background:

The Water, Environment and Climate (WEC) portfolio, based in Vienna, and with offices based globally, is part of the UNOPS Global Portfolio Office. The Portfolio has built strong partnerships and is effectively managing a portfolio of over 500 million USD over the last 15 years to support key initiatives with fund management, project implementation and administrative support. WEC effectively operationalizes partners' agendas with global approaches, as well as regional and country specific activities focused on climate action, protection and conservation of the environment. Partners profit from WEC’s ability to operationalize and/or scale up their important substantive agendas, including in support of key multilateral environmental and climate agreements, such as the Paris Agreement, the Cartagena Convention as well as the Sustainable Development Goals.

About The Group

The NDC Partnership:

The NDC Partnership is a global coalition, bringing together more than 250 members, including more than 130 countries, developed and developing, and more than 110 institutions to deliver on ambitious climate action that helps achieve the Paris Agreement and drive sustainable development. Governments identify their NDC implementation priorities and the type of support that is needed to translate them into actionable policies and programs. Based on these requests, the membership offers a tailored package of expertise, technical assistance and funding. This collaborative response provides developing countries with efficient access to a wide range of resources to adapt to and mitigate climate change and foster more equitable and sustainable development. The NDC Partnership Support Unit is jointly hosted by the World Resources Institute (WRI), the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS) and the UN Climate Change Secretariat (UNFCCC). For this project, the Consultant will be contracted through UNOPS.

Role Purpose

To support access to climate finance through a programmatic approach, the Government of Rwanda requested technical support from the NDC Partnership for developing systemic and programmatic responses that mobilize finance for climate action. This support will work from existing pipelines and priorities for action, including the NDC implementation framework, the GGCRS programs of action and previously developed investment plans. In response to this request, the NDC Partnership is hiring an embedded advisor to support Rwanda in this process to coordinate sectors and development partners in developing investment plans with specific roles as outlined below. This advisor position will collaborate closely with FONERWA and the Ministry of Environment, with support from the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN). The person will also coordinate directly with the NDC Partnership’s in-country facilitator supporting the Ministry of Environment.

Functions / Key Results Expected

• Investment Plan Development and Coordination: Advice the government on the recruitment of the consultants aimed to support the development of the investable proposals within the 3 investment plans already developed (Sustainable Land management, sustainable cities and climate smart agriculture) ensuring collaboration with sectors and the technical team of FONERWA and MINECOFIN’s Climate Finance department. Coordinate technical assistance, international experts or firms, that lead investment planning activities, including for example: costing, impact analysis, activity sequencing, among others.
• Climate Finance Tracking and Reporting: Update (monthly/quarterly) the climate finance dashboard as well as climate budget tagging to provide accurate information on the climate finance flows and pipeline of climate finance programs and make sure that the climate related projects are integral to GGCRS programs of Action, Climate and Nature finance strategy and Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) and are intended to deliver results on adaptation, mitigation, finance, technology transfer and capacity building components of the updated NDC 3.0.
• Capacity Building and Decentralization: Lead the capacity building and roll out of climate budget tagging in all sectors and coordinate the TA for decentralization of climate budget tagging. Also support MINECOFIN to produce Climate Budget statement as an annex to the Budget Framework paper as well as quarterly and annual expenditure reports
• Programmatic Investment Alignment: Advise the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning on the development of the program concept note, follow selection and appraisal processes of new investments to be inline with the programmatic approach as enshrined in the National investment policy.
• Stakeholder Engagement and Ownership: Lead the stakeholders’ consultations on different development aspects (green taxonomy, nature and finance strategy) at all levels and ensure the strong ownership of sectors. The advisor will engage the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning and other MDAs to ensure alignment of the investment plan with the national strategic targets and other ongoing initiatives at the national and sub-national levels in line with programmatic approach.
• Investment Plan Pipeline Oversight: Provide oversight and ensure reliable and timely deliverables towards investment plan pipeline that sets out the programming directions that facilitate and inform coordinated and comprehensive resources mobilization.
• Partnership and Resource Mobilization: Work closely with the Taskforce team on Access to Climate Finance under the PFM and the NDC Partnership in-country facilitator in engaging development partners to accelerate access to climate finance for successful climate action through implementation of GGCRS and reporting on NDC/SDGs targets.
• Capacity Development in Climate Financing: Lead capacity development of individuals as well as institutional expertise in programmatic climate financing and proposal development.

Required Education and Experience

• Education Requirements: Master's degree or equivalent in finance, economics, environment, natural sciences, or another related area or any other relevant field of study with 7 years of relevant experience. Bachelor’s degree with an additional 2 years of relevant work experience (9 total) may be accepted in lieu of an advanced degree.
• Experience Requirements:
  • At least 7 years of relevant working experience in the areas of climate change and climate finance.
  • Experience with results-based management and logical frameworks.
  • Proven experience leading other experts in the field of climate finance, environment and other related fields.
  • Demonstrated experience in resource mobilization for environmental and natural resources management and climate adaptation and mitigation.
  • Demonstrated experience in organizing stakeholder capacity building workshops and producing knowledge products.
  • Demonstrated skills and experience in policy support, research and analysis, training, capacity building and institutional strengthening particularly in the area of environmental management and climate change.
  • Proven skills and applications in Microsoft office (Excel, Word, PowerPoint).
  • Good understanding of planning processes and stakeholders of Rwanda.

Desired Experience

• Experience in providing oversight and managing stakeholders at national, regional and international levels.
• Experience with developing climate finance flow frameworks to support decision making.
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.

Key skills/competency

• Climate Finance
• Investment Planning
• Stakeholder Engagement
• Capacity Building
• Resource Mobilization
• Project Coordination
• Policy Support
• Results-Based Management
• Data Analysis
• Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation