Title: PAIDAR Technical Expert (Roster) - Productive Sector
โโRequisition ID: 2166
Grade: ISA-Senior Specialist or National Expert (SB-5)
Country: Pakistan
Duty Station: Karachi and/or interior Sindh
Category: International & National Expert
Type of Job Posting: Internal/External
Employment Type: Non-staff
Contract Duration: TBD
Application Deadline: 10-Jan-2025
Vacancy Announcement
TEMPORARY APPOINTMENT OF PROJECT PERSONNEL
Female candidates are particularly encouraged to apply.
ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT
The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) is the specialized agency of the United Nations that promotes industrial development for poverty reduction, inclusive globalization and environmental sustainability. The mission of UNIDO, as described in the Lima Declaration adopted at the fifteenth session of the UNIDO General Conference in 2013 as well as the Abu Dhabi Declaration adopted at the eighteenth session of UNIDO General Conference in 2019, is to promote and accelerate inclusive and sustainable industrial development (ISID) in Member States. The relevance of ISID as an integrated approach to all three pillars of sustainable development is recognized by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which will frame United Nations and country efforts towards sustainable development. UNIDOโs mandate is fully recognized in SDG-9, which calls to โBuild resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovationโ. The relevance of ISID, however, applies in greater or lesser extent to all SDGs. Accordingly, the Organizationโs programmatic focus is structured in four strategic priorities: Creating shared prosperity; Advancing economic competitiveness; Safeguarding the environment; and Strengthening knowledge and institutions.
Each of these programmatic fields of activity contains a number of individual programmes, which are implemented in a holistic manner to achieve effective outcomes and impacts through UNIDOโs four enabling functions: (i) technical cooperation; (ii) analytical and research functions and policy advisory services; (iii) normative functions and standards and quality-related activities; and (iv) convening and partnerships for knowledge transfer, networking and industrial cooperation. Such core functions are carried out in Departments/Offices in its Headquarters, Regional Offices and Hubs and Country Offices.
The Directorate of Technical Cooperation and Sustainable Industrial Development (TCS), headed by a Managing Director, oversees the Organization's development of capacities for industrial development as well as industrial policy advice, statistics and research activities and the Organization's normative contribution to Member States and global development community in achieving the SDGs. The Directorate also ensures the application of strategies and interventions for sustainable industrial development related to Environment, Energy, SMEs, Competitiveness and Job creation, as well as Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence. Through coordination in-house and with Member States and industry stakeholders, it ensures that the services provided in these areas contribute toward effective and appropriate technical, business and policy solutions and are focused on results and on realizing any potential for scaling up and positioning UNIDO as a leading platform for industrial development in developing countries and global fora.
The Directorate houses the technical Divisions of Capacity Development and Industrial Policy Advice (TCS/CAP); Circular Economy and Environmental Protection (TCS/CEP); Decarbonization and Sustainable Energy (TCS/DSE); SMEs, Competitiveness and Job Creation (TCS/SME); and Digital Transformation and AI Strategies (TCS/DAS). The Directorate also ensures close coordination and collaboration among the Divisions as well as with relevant entities in the Directorate of Global Partnerships and External Relations (GLO) and the Directorate of SDG Innovation and Economic Transformation (IET).
This position is located under the Competitiveness, Quality and Compliance Unit (TCS/SME/CQC) which builds national and regional production and quality infrastructure systems, with an emphasis on providing internationally recognized services, facilitating SME participation in regional and global value chains; strengthening institutional quality infrastructure capacities (i.e. standardization, metrology, and accreditation); building conformity assessment capacities (testing, inspection, certification, calibration, etc.); and supporting trade facilitation and quality awareness with the public sector, economic operators and consumers, placing a special emphasis on capacitating SMEs.
PROJECT CONTEXT (ID 200183):
Poverty Alleviation and Inclusive Development Across Rural Sindh (PAIDAR) is a five-year programme funded by the European Union to support the Government of Sindh (GoS), Pakistan in implementation of its Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS). The long-term objective of PAIDAR is to contribute to sustainable poverty reduction and improvement of livelihoods of poor women, men and young people across Sindh province.
The PRS has three pillars: 1) Community Driven Local Development 2) Addressing Urban Poverty including Urban Economic Clusters and 3) Rural Growth Centres.
Purpose of PAIDAR programme is to support the GoS to implement its poverty reduction strategy as a whole and in particular sub-strategies that aim at:
- Fostering economic development, enterprise development and job creation with the objective of increasing income of the poor women, men and young people
- Optimizing public service delivery to enhance access to livelihood improving services such as water, electricity, health services and education with the ultimate objectives of both improving living conditions and quality of life and reducing poor householdโ expenditure that arises as a cost resulting from lack of access to such services and poor living conditions.
To this end, the programme will:
- Provide necessary technical assistance, capacity building and financial support to a significant number of micro and small enterprises in target RGCs with the objective to overcome COVID-19 impacts on enterprises, support enterprise development and business development.
- Contribute technically and financially to building and upgrading public infrastructure for improvement in delivery of basic service with direct impact on poor peopleโs livelihood as well as services to support business development.
- Strengthen capacity of the GoS at provincial and local level for implementation of the PRS and assist the GoS to strengthen internal coordination and monitoring capacity, and to optimize provincial public resources allocation towards meeting PRS objectives.
PAIDAR will deliver on the above objectives through utilization of three key mechanisms:
- Co-financing public investment projects of the GoS aiming to build and/or upgrade public infrastructure for delivery of basic services with high impact on livelihood improvement and poverty reduction, as well as for delivery of services with high potential to contribute to economic development of the target RGCs and foster enterprise development.
- Provision of grants to support MSMEs investment projects which demonstrate strong potential for enterprise development, income generation, job retention and creation.
Technical assistance to the GoS and the MSMEs to ensure investment projects (both co-financed public infrastructure development projects and financially supported MSME investment projects) are designed, planned and implemented to deliver results in line with the objectives of the PRS; and to strengthen GoS capacity to plan, implement and monitor results PRS /Overview/UNIDO Project Summary/Project Purpose>/Rationale>
Duties and responsibilities:
As the focus of the PAIDAR programme is on poverty alleviation through job creation and business development, especially the MSMEs, therefore one of the key thematic areas of importance for the programme is the productive sectors. Keeping in view that the programme is being implemented in the districts of Thatta, Sajawal, Badin, Tharparkar and Larkana in Sindh, the following productive sectors have been identified from the growth and job creation perspectives:
- Productive sectors
- Food processing and distribution (especially rice & rice husk, tomato, edible oils
- Handicraft (e.g., stitching, woodwork, furniture)
- Apparel and accessories
- Logistics and cold chains
- Recycling and circular businesses
- Fisheries/aquaculture
- Automotive/Vehicle Repair
- Metal works
- Furniture and Dรฉcor
- Social entrepreneurship
In this connection, and in order to develop these sectors, the programme is seeking relevant experts and consultants to enlist in its roster of experts and, later on, their engagement in the programme as and when needed. The specific activities will depend on the needs of supported businesses and potential business development service providers. The relevant technical expertise areas may include the following, corresponding to one or more one of the above-mentioned sectors:
Areas of technical expertise
Productivity and Quality (including quality management, product certification, process optimisation, factory layout planning)
Skills, Technology and Innovation (including product design, research and development, process design, value-addition and product innovation, technology and equipment upgrading, skills development and training)
Entrepreneurship (including incubation, start-ups, social entrepreneurship, women entrepreneurship)
Market development (including Market study and assessment, Marketing and branding, market intelligence, marketing planning and strategies, Import/export documentation, export market planning)
Financial management (including feasibility studies, business plan development, financial accounting, planning and management)
Operations management (including inventory control and management, supply chain management, shop floor management, procurement, maintenance planning and repairs)
The engagement of the experts will depend upon the specific requirements of an intervention; however, a general description of the expected tasks is given below:
MAIN DUTIES
Concrete/
measurable
Outputs to be achieved
Expected duration
Location
Provide technical assistance to the enterprises in the areas of expertise as listed above.
Identification of business areas for improvement; development of intervention for MSMEs
TBD
Interior Sindh
Closely cooperate with and guide MSMEs and clusters/cooperatives on the required areas of technical expertise.
Implementation of interventions with MSMEs
TBD
Interior Sindh
Target oriented solutions to improve MSMEs revenue and profits.
Business plans developed
TBD
Interior Sindh
Identify employment opportunities and technical skills in the relevant technical area of expertise.
Linkages with TVET institutes generated; support for hiring suitable candidates
TBD
Interior Sindh
Build capacity of MSMEs staff on specific skill sets.
Enhanced capacities of MSME staff
TBD
Interior Sindh
Come up with recommendations to smooth out supply chain and value chain bottlenecks.
Business processes and value chain linkages improved
TBD
Interior Sindh
Generate involvement of business development service providers to establish/strengthen affordable and accessible technical services for the MSMEs.
Linkages between MSMEs and business development service providers generated
TBD
Interior Sindh