Consultancy: Risk Analyst

Type of Contract: Regular Consultancy
Location: Johannesburg, South Africa/Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire
Duration: 11 months, with scope for extension

Background

In 2012, the African Risk Capacity (ARC) was established by treaty as a Specialised Agency of the African Union (AU) to help Member States improve their capacities to better plan, prepare and respond to extreme weather events and natural disasters, therefore protecting the food security of their vulnerable populations. By linking early warning systems with contingency planning and supported by modern financial mechanisms, ARC enables governments to provide targeted responses to disasters in a more timely, cost-effective, objective and transparent manner, thereby reducing response costs and loss of livelihoods.

To date, the ARC Establishment Agreement has been signed by 33 countries across the continent, and is an indication of the comprehensive endorsement of the work being undertaken by ARC as part of Africa’s new climate and disaster management infrastructure. In 2014, the member governments established ARC Insurance Company Limited (ARC Ltd), the Agency’s financial affiliate, which is licensed as a mutual insurer, to manage the risk taken on through underwriting a pool of weather and other disaster risks. Together ARC Agency, an international organisation, and ARC Ltd, the dedicated sovereign risk insurance facility, comprise the ARC Group.

Capitalised with US $90m (based on a 20 year no-interest US $200 m loan) in risk capital from the British and German governments, eight countries have purchased insurance from ARC Ltd through the four drought risk pools since 2014. During this period, ARC Ltd has also made payouts totalling ~US $36 million to drought affected countries (US $26 million to Senegal, Niger and Mauritania collectively in early 2015 and US $8 million to Malawi in early 2017 and US $2.4 million to Mauritania in 2018). These payouts have gone towards assisting over 2.1 million people and over a million livestock.

Since its creation in 2012 the ARC Agency has been working towards establishing and mainstreaming its operational procedures and in-country work programme with ARC Member States. At the country-level the ARC Secretariat of the ARC Agency supports ARC in-country technical working groups on several technical and political work-streams as they progress towards making an informed decision on participating in the ARC Ltd insurance pool. The ARC Secretariat Technical Support Division supports the technical aspects of this interaction, including working with countries to customise and validate Africa RiskView and select risk transfer parameters for their insurance products.

Responsibilities

Based in ARC Headquarters in Johannesburg or the regional office in Abidjan, the Risk Analyst will be a key member of the ARC Secretariat Technical Support Division leading all aspects of the ARC Technical Support Division’s work in-country interactions with ARC Member States. Reporting to the Technical Team Manager, the Risk Analyst’s responsibilities will include the following:

1. Understand ARC, its risk modelling platform Africa RiskView and its underlying methodology;
2. Lead the Technical Support Division on all matters relating to the customisation of Africa RiskView and preparation for participation in the risk transfer pool in assigned countries, including:

   • Conduct background research to understand the risk factors and risk profiles of ARC Member States;

   • Gather and prepare historical data on droughts and other natural disasters in ARC Member States;

   • Lead the analyses of relevant datasets required for the customisation of Africa RiskView in assigned ARC Member States;

   • Provide technical support to the drafting and review of customisation reports by TWGs;

   • Monitor and verify Africa RiskView’s estimates against information from the ground;

   • Monitor Africa RiskView’s estimates to contribute to monthly bulletins and other ad hoc analyses and publications;

   • Document the ARC Technical Team’s in-country activities

3. Lead the Technical Support Division in designing and conducting Africa RiskView country and regional trainings, preparing training materials and support documentation in assigned countries;
4. Support the development, upgrade and update of the Africa RiskView software and its related manuals, Standard Operating Procedures, other documentation and country briefs;
5. Work collaboratively with other departments of ARC in developing country strategies, country risk profiles and provide input into the development of other strategic documents;
6. Contribute to the design and development of new methodologies for the expansion of Africa RiskView to new risks including flood and cyclone and support the in-country work required to ground-truth and calibrate new models;
7. Support ARC management and other senior staff in undertaking other tasks, including reporting to donors and in collaborations with ARC partners, as necessary;
8. Represent the ARC Secretariat at conferences and meetings, as required.

Qualifications & Experience Required

Education:

• Advanced university degree in Agricultural Economics/Economics, Agriculture, Statistics, Food Security, Natural Sciences, Data Science, Geography or other related field, or First University degree with 2 two additional years of relevant work experience from the minimum experience requirement stated below.

Experience:

• At least 6 years of postgraduate progressively responsible professional experience in food security and resilience analysis or a closely related area, such as agricultural risk management or early warning systems development and implementation
• Experience in modelling of natural disasters such as drought and floods would be an asset.

​Desired Technical Skills:

• Expert user of Microsoft Excel. Good knowledge of statistical packages, SPSS, Stata or R for quantitative data analysis.
• Experience in leading surveys, multiple assessments in countries, including the design, data collection and analysis.
• Experience in collecting geospatial and socioeconomic food security data, conducting quantitative and qualitative analyses, and reporting findings to a wide audience.
• Basic knowledge of Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and Remote Sensing and experience in use of remotely sensed products would be an added advantage.
• Demonstrated ability to write clear technical reports for a diverse range of audience.

Languages:

• Fluency in oral and written English or French and intermediate knowledge of the other; knowledge of Portuguese is an asset.

Competencies:

• Strong analytical and data interpretation skills
• Reliability, attention to detail and problem-solving skills
• Ability to work both collaboratively and under minimum supervision, and under tight deadlines
• Availability to undertake frequent travel