DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS10 June 2025-23:59-GMT+03:00 Eastern European Time (Damascus)
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 worldโs 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).
Organizational Context
Syria continues to experience a humanitarian crisis characterized by ongoing violence, repeated displacements, economic challenges, and eroded services. These issues have led to severe food insecurity, with 14.5 million people requiring food assistance; among them, 9.1 million are acutely food insecure, and 1.4 million are in IPC phase 4 or above. Additionally, over 7.4 million individuals remain internally displaced, while 6 million are refugees abroad. Bread subsidy cuts in Decemberโraising prices by 486 percentโare projected to push the severely food insecure from 1.4 million to 2.6 million, and although the cost of the Minimum Expenditure Basket fell by 20 percent between March 2024 and March 2025, the minimum wage still covers only 13 percent of its food component. Cash liquidity constraints, including ATM withdrawal limits and a split between official and parallel exchange rates, further weaken purchasing power, while 2025 cereal production is forecast below the five-year average due to delayed planting, conflict damage, dry conditions, and high input costs. Critical cuts in humanitarian and development funding during this fragile transition are forcing agencies to extremely prioritize interventions.
In this dire context, the presence of the World Food Programme (WFP) remains vital. Under its current Country Strategic Plan (2022-2025), WFP continues to provide life-saving and transformative assistance through emergency and targeted food assistance, nutritional support for vulnerable women, girls, and children, early recovery efforts, school feeding programmes, and support for humanitarian partners. Additionally, WFP is innovating service delivery mechanisms to ensure additional transparency and accountability to the communities it serves. Faced with reduced funding, WFP is transitioning to a prioritized assistance framework and seeks energetic, self-driven, and passionate individuals to support its vision of an agile, responsive, and above all person-centric operation.
In recognition of the varying needs of the population, WFP has consistently diversified its portfolio of interventions over the past 4 years and expanded activities with a medium/longer-term objective, aiming to mitigate the longer-term impacts of the crisis, including the erosion of livelihoods and household resilience. WFP Syriaโs resilience strategy includes three main pillars: (i) community-based asset rehabilitation, complemented by food for asset activities following an area-based approach (ii) food system restoration and enhancement of food value chains (iii) technical assistance to the national social protection system.
WFPโs resilience strategy in Syria is aligned with the Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) and the UN Strategic Framework (UNSF). The strategy is also informed by needs identified by various ministries, including the Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform (MAAR); the Ministry of Water Resources (MoWR); the Ministry of Internal Trade and Consumer Protection (MoITCP) and the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labour (MoSAL).
Job Purpose
He/she will support the roll out of a wide range of interventions oriented towards enhancing the resilience of food systems, including the enhancement of main value chains in Syria. She/he will support the identification and analysis of potential bottlenecks along the system, and potential entry/intervention points. He/She will support the overall work of the unit including policy research and development and supporting various programme activities.
Contract Details
Contract Type: Fixed Term.
Duration: 12 Months.Duty Station: Damascus.
Number of required employees: 1Key Accountabilities
- In line with the resilience/livelihood strategy, assessing current food systems and identifying key areas for improvement, in coordination with internal and external stakeholders.
- Provide technical inputs on food systems, value chains and support the integration of food systems concepts within the framework of the Livelihoods Strategy and overall strategic plans of WFP Syria.
- Contribute to the design and implementation of programmes and projects related to enhancing food systems, value chain development, and agricultural and rural development.
- Design and implement value chain analyses of target food commodities, work on stakeholder engagement and provide detailed recommendations on how and what can be done (potential interventions) to address key value chain bottlenecks and imbalances. This might include performing different activities related to agribusiness, market access, nutrition, gender, climate, social protection/social safety, food value chain and food system development.
- Contribute towards the development of bread value chain projects, plans and processes, ensuring alignment with wider programme policies at CO and corporate level.
- Developing and reviewing information materials, technical papers and guidelines on topics, such as market and policy analysis, business enabling environment, institutional strengthening; inclusive business models, entrepreneurship; contract farming, digital solutions/technologies, marketing, value chain finance, business support services; public-private platforms and partnerships.
- Provide support to coordination and implementation of projects, internally and externally.
- Ensure a coordinated approach with wider programmes and liaise with other units: Engineering, Procurement, M&E, Finance etc.
- Ensure regular data collections and monitoring activities are corresponding to rigorous quality standards and informing policy decisions.
- Ensure extensive support and guidance to Area and Field Offices in the selection, design, implementation, and monitoring of resilience and livelihood projects, especially those related to value chain development.
- Research and develop a range