E T Consultant

E T Consultant

Description

At the World Bank, a member of the World Bank Group (WBG), you’ll join a diverse, global community working across cultures, disciplines, and borders to address the world’s most pressing development challenges. With 1.2 billion young people reaching working age in the decade ahead, the challenge of job creation has never been greater. Through partnerships across 145 countries and more than 182 offices worldwide, we work with governments, private sector, development partners and other stakeholders to invest in people, strengthen markets, and deliver scalable, data-driven solutions that generate more and better jobs and improve lives. For more information, visit https://www.worldbank.org/en/who-we-are/ibrd   

Ethiopia faces one of the most severe malnutrition burdens in Sub-Saharan Africa. Despite significant progress over recent decades, including a reduction in child stunning from 58 percent in 2000 to 37 percent in 2019, the country continues to grapple with persistently high rates of undernutrition, micronutrient deficiencies, and food insecurity. Recent shocks that the country experienced are feared of eroding the hard-fought gains with child stunning rates already sliding back to 40 percent in 2025. About one in five women of reproductive age (15-49 years) are undernourished, and 13 percent of them are anemic in 2023. Vitamin A supplementation among children aged 6-59 months was 19 percent while only 17 percent of pregnant women took iron folic acid (IFA) tablets for 90+ days in 2023.  Similarly, though improvements have been observed over recent decades, provision of primary health care services remains low and inequitable. In 2025, only 53 percent of women had four or more antenatal care visits during their latest pregnancy and only 30 percent of children aged 12-23 months were fully vaccinated with basic antigens. 

The World Bank's engagement on nutrition and primary health care in Ethiopia is substantial, long-standing, and deeply multisectoral. Key operations include the Ethiopia Human Capital Operation (HCO, P172284) - a hybrid Program-for-Results (PforR) and Investment Project Financing (IPF) instrument that focuses on improving nutrition and learning outcomes for children across all regions, including conflict-affected, drought-affected, and refugee-hosting areas. The Ethiopia Program-for-Results (Hybrid) Strengthening Primary Health Care Services (P175167) is another major portfolio with a focus of expanding access to primary healthcare services and supporting nutrition agenda in Ethiopia. The Bank's multisectoral Ethiopia Early Years agenda, convened across HNP, Education, Social Protection and Jobs (SPJ), Agriculture and Food, and Water GPs, further reflect the imperative of coordinated action to reduce stunting and improve early childhood development outcomes at the woreda level.

The Government of Ethiopia, through its 10-Year Perspective Development Plan (Pathway to Prosperity, 2021–2030), has prioritized human capital development through equitable and quality health, education, and nutrition services. The Federal Ministry of Health leads implementation of the National Nutrition Program (NNP) and the Health Sector Transformation Plan II (HSTP II), which positions nutrition within a broader multisectoral accountability framework. The Multi-sector Woreda Transformation (MSWT) Plan is a flagship vehicle for convergent service delivery at decentralized levels.

To strengthen the Bank's nutrition program portfolio and analytical agenda in Ethiopia, the HNP Global Practice is seeking an Extended Term Consultant (ETC) to serve as its Nutrition Specialist/Economist. Based in the World Bank Ethiopia Country Office (Addis Ababa), the consultant will play a lead technical and economic role in supporting nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive investment lending operations, advisory services and analytics (ASAs), and multisectoral coordination across relevant GPs and with government and development partners in Ethiopia. The position combines nutrition program expertise with applied economics competencies, enabling rigorous analysis of the economic returns to nutrition investments, cost-effectiveness of nutrition interventions, and nutrition's role in human capital accumulation and productivity.

Objective

The objective of this assignment is to provide high-quality technical and economic expertise to advance the World Bank's nutrition agenda in Ethiopia, across HNP portfolio and in close collaboration with the Education, and other relevant GPs as well as support the Bank work on primary healthcare services. The consultant will combine nutrition program knowledge with applied economics to support operational activities, produce rigorous analytical and advisory work, and strengthen multisectoral coordination with government counterparts, development partners, and civil society.

Scope of Work and Responsibilities

The Ethiopia HNP team is seeking a Nutrition specialist / Economist who will become a key member of the team in providing technical support to the overall implementation of nutrition agenda under the HNP portfolio as well as across related GPs including Education, Social Protection and Agriculture. The work will extend across the Ethiopia PforR (Hybrid) for SPHCS program, HCO project, and other programs and will focus on providing technical support to nutrition agenda and in the delivery of the expanding analytical program supported by various Trust Funds, including organizing and coordinating various forums/dialogues with nutrition working groups and other development partners in the health sector. The work will also involve supporting complementary analytical work on healthcare financing, primary healthcare services, and human capital. Specifically, main duties and responsibilities include:

•  Serve as a primary technical resource for nutrition components within Ethiopia HNP lending operation, including the Strengthening Primary Health Care Services Program (P175167), Ethiopia Human Capital Operation (P172284), and any follow-on or pipeline operations, spanning PforR and IPF modalities

•  Provide technical support to the design and implementation of Disbursement-Linked Indicators (DLIs) related to nutrition outcomes under PforR operations

•  Provide technical inputs to Education, Social and Agriculture GPs operations with nutrition-sensitive components.

•  Review and contribute to project concept notes, Project Appraisal Documents (PADs), Implementation Completion and Results Reports (ICRs), restructuring papers, and supervision aide-memoires

•  Lead and contribute to Ethiopia-specific analytical work on nutrition, including nutrition situation analyses, stunting investment case analysis, and policy motes for government and development partners

•  Apply economic methods to analyze the costs, cost-effectiveness, and returns on investment of nutrition interventions in Ethiopia

•  Conduct and support research on the linkages between nutrition, human capital development, and economic productivity in Ethiopia.

•  Lead public expenditure and financing analyses for the nutrition sector in Ethiopia, including tracking of domestic and external financing flows, budget analysis, fiscal space assessments, and nutrition resource mapping across line ministries

•  Contribute to the design and execution of impact evaluations, operational research, and program evaluations embedded in Ethiopia Bank-supported operations, including end-line assessments for PforR DLIs and cost-effectiveness assessments of community-based nutrition interventions

•  Provide technical expertise at the intersection of nutrition and Ethiopia’s Human Capital agenda

•  Provide technical support to supply chain strengthening for therapeutic foods, micronutrient supplements, and growth monitoring equipment across the public health system

•  Maintain and strengthen partnerships with Ethiopia’s key nutrition stakeholders, including Ministry of Health, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Education, UNICEF, WHO, WFP, FAO, EU, bilateral donors, and the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement secretariat.

•  Contribute to the preparation of presentations, briefing notes, and communications for World Bank senior management, the Ethiopia CMU, government counterparts, and external audiences.

Selection Criteria

Essential

•  Advanced degree (Master's or PhD) in nutrition, health economics, economics, public health, food and nutrition policy, or a related field. Candidates with a strong economics background and significant nutrition program experience are equally encouraged to apply.

•  Minimum of 5–8 years of relevant professional experience in nutrition programming, health economics, policy analysis, or research, with a strong preference for experience in Sub-Saharan Africa, and ideally Ethiopia.

•  Demonstrated technical expertise in nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive interventions, including maternal and child nutrition, micronutrient programs (IFA, Vitamin A, zinc), IYCF, and CMAM.

•  Experience in applied economic analysis relevant to nutrition or health, such as cost-effectiveness analysis, public expenditure reviews, benefit-cost analysis, investment case development, or economic impact assessments.

•  Experience supporting or managing multilateral or bilateral nutrition operations in low-income country contexts, including in fragile, conflict-affected, or humanitarian settings.

•  Proven track record in producing high-quality analytical outputs, including policy briefs, economic analyses, sector assessments, and working papers.

•  Strong understanding of multisectoral approaches to nutrition and experience coordinating across health, education, agriculture, social protection, and WASH sectors.

•  Familiarity with Ethiopia's health system, including the Health Extension Program (HEP), HSTP, and the National Nutrition Program (NNP), or with analogous systems in the region.

•  Familiarity with human capital development frameworks and primary health care service delivery

Desirable

•  Prior experience working with or within the World Bank, other multilateral development banks, or major UN agencies active in Ethiopia (UNICEF, WHO, WFP, FAO).

•  Experience with World Bank lending instruments, particularly Program-for-Results and IPF, and familiarity with DLI design for nutrition outcomes.

•  Proficiency in economic and statistical tools including Stata, R, or Python, with experience analyzing DHS, mini-DHS, or SMART datasets.

•  Experience supporting the design or implementation of community-based nutrition programs, national nutrition plans, or ECD programs at scale.

Competencies

•  Strong analytical and problem-solving skills, with the ability to synthesize complex information from multiple sources.

•  Ability to work effectively in multidisciplinary and multicultural teams across different time zones and country contexts

•  Strong interpersonal and stakeholder engagement skills, including the ability to build productive relationships with government counterparts, development partners, and civil society.

•  High degree of initiative, self-direction, and ability to manage multiple priorities under tight deadlines.

•  Commitment to the World Bank Group’s mission of reducing poverty and boosting shared prosperity.

WBG Culture Attributes:

1. Sense of urgency: Anticipate and quickly respond to the needs of internal and external stakeholders.
2. Thoughtful risk-taking: Challenge the status quo and push boundaries to achieve greater impact.
3. Empowerment and accountability: Empower yourself and others to act and hold each other accountable for results.

World Bank Group Core Competencies

As per WBG policy, an Extended Term (ET) appointment is subject to a lifetime maximum of three (3) years. Former and current ET staff who have completed or are in the process of completing their third-year ET appointment are not eligible for future ET appointments.

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