UN-Water is the United Nations (UN) inter-agency coordination mechanism for all freshwater related issues, including sanitation. The High-Level Committee on Programmes (HLCP) established UN-Water in its meeting held on 18 and 19 September 2003 in response to the need for strengthened coordination of the United Nations’ work on water and sanitation-related issues. The Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB) endorsed this decision at its fall 2003 session in New York. UN-Water currently counts 33 Members (UN entities) and 41 Partners (non-UN system actors).
UN-Water promotes coherence in, and coordination of, water-related UN system actions aimed at the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and other relevant policy frameworks, such as the Paris Agreement on climate change, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, the Addis Ababa Action Agenda on financing for development and the New Urban Agenda. In so doing, UN-Water complements and adds value to existing UN initiatives by facilitating synergies and joint efforts among the implementing agencies and by fostering greater co-operation and information-sharing within its constituency. UN-Water supports the Member States through its three main lines of work: 1. Informing policy processes and addressing emerging issues; 2. Supporting monitoring and reporting on water and sanitation; and 3. Building knowledge and inspiring people to take action.
For UN Member States as well as the international community, the coming years will be critical to solve the water and sanitation crisis. Although Sustainable Development Goal 6 (SDG 6) – ‘to ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all by 2030’ – supports many of the other 16 SDGs, the world is alarmingly off-track and the challenges are unprecedented and growing. To respond to the need for an immediate and integrated global response to rapidly improve progress on SDG 6, in July 2020 the UN system launched the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework – a unifying initiative that involves all sectors of society to speed up progress by improving support to countries. Through the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework, the UN system and its multi-stakeholder partners, driven by country demand and coordinating through UN-Water, unify the international community’s support to countries for SDG 6. The SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework involves:

• A sharpened focus on coherent, coordinated and streamlined country support as part of the UN reform, including scaling up water-related work and collaboration among the UN-Water Members and Partners, providing access to expertise, technical assistance, and advocacy support through a reinvigorated Resident Coordinators system and a new generation of UN Country Teams;
• A multi-stakeholder, high-level, annual stock-taking moment, complemented by the SDG 6 Action Space, to enable stakeholders to keep up momentum on and accelerate the implementation of SDG 6, as well as share lessons and best practices;
• A purpose-driven collaboration among all stakeholders including various initiatives providing new activities in support of the Global Acceleration Framework; and
• An SDG 6 Action Space platform to showcase on-going actions, share experiences, raise awareness and inspire actions among all types of people and organizations.

The impact of the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework relies also on its synergies with the following critical milestone events mandated by UN General Assembly resolution 73/226:

• The 2021 one-day high-level meeting hosted by the President of the General Assembly to promote the implementation of the water-related goals and targets of the 2030 Agenda for sustainable development as part of the Midterm Comprehensive Review of the Implementation of the International Decade for Action, ‘Water for Sustainable Development’, 2018-2028;
• The 2023 UN Conference on the Midterm Comprehensive Review of the Implementation of the Objectives of the International Decade for Action, ‘Water for Sustainable Development’, 2018–2028; and
• Their respective preparatory processes.

Within the UN-Water family, activities related to the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework will be carried out by the UN-Water’s Task Force on Country Level Engagement, Expert Group on Regional Level Coordination, and Expert Group on 2030 Agenda, with the UN-Water Technical Advisory Unit providing technical support to these groups and ensuring the necessary coordination.

Within the Technical Advisory Unit, the Technical Officer will be responsible for: providing technical support to the abovementioned Task Force and Expert Groups; coordinating the activities among them to ensure coherence; managing the liaison with the United Nations Development Coordination Office (DCO) and UN Country Teams; identifying and analyzing opportunities for country-level engagement and regional level coordination, and initiating the resulting actions, and leading the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework communications and dissemination activities.

FUNCTIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES

• In the context of the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework, this position is located in the UN-Water Technical Advisory Unit in Geneva. Under the overall guidance of the UN-Water Chair and the direct supervision of the UN-Water Chief Technical Adviser, the incumbent is responsible for the following:
• Overall support to the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework:
• Coordinates information sharing on all actions resulting from the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework within the UN-Water family, providing substantive technical support to UN-Water Members and Partners;
• Coordinates outreach through the Action Space, including developing and updating contents to be featured on the website, technical support for website development, liaison with UN DESA and with the main initiatives in support of the Global Acceleration Framework, and the World Water Day and World Toilet Day campaign to ensure coherence with the Decade of Action’s and the campaigns’ online resources;
• Facilitates UN-Water activities ensuring the synergy between the SDG 6 Global Acceleration Framework – including its annual moment – and the critical milestone events listed above;
• Provides substantive technical support to and participates in the organization of the annual high-level stock-taking moments and of side events in relevant international meetings and conferences.

EDUCATION/EXPERIENCE/LANGUAGE REQUIREMENTS
Education

• Advanced university degree (Master’s degree or equivalent) in earth sciences, water resources management, sanitary or environmental engineering, international development, environmental management, environmental journalism/communications, or related disciplines.Experience
• A minimum of five years of progressively responsible relevant experience in water and development, of which at least two years of experience in the areas of the UN system’s country/regional level support is required.
• Experience in international development issues as they relate to water and sanitation, including key players and processes, is required.
• Experience in building and promoting good working relationships and collaboration across cultures and distance is required.
• Practical experience in water-related sectoral management, monitoring, data, and data management and capacity development and/or sustainable finance and consumption aspects is desirable.

Language

• Fluency in spoken and written English is required. Knowledge of French and/or other UN official languages is an advantage.

Source:https://jobs.unops.org/Pages/ViewVacancy/VADetails.aspx?id=20761