Established in 1944, the WBG is one of the world’s largest sources of funding and knowledge for development solutions. In fiscal year 2018, the WBG committed $67 billion in loans, grants, equity investments and guarantees to its members and private businesses, of which $24 billion was concessional finance to its poorest members. It is governed by 188-member countries and delivers services out of 120 offices with nearly 15,000 staff located globally.
The WBG consists of five specialized institutions: the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), the International Development Association (IDA), the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), and the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). The World Bank is organized into six client-facing Regional Vice-Presidencies, several corporate functions and thirteen Global Practices to bring best-in-class knowledge and solutions to regional and country clients.
The World Bank supports social protection and jobs programs in developing countries as a central part of its mission to end extreme poverty and foster shared prosperity. The World Bank’s 10-year Social Protection and Jobs1 Strategy’s main objective is to help countries move from fragmented projects to harmonized social protection and labor systems. It focuses on making these systems more inclusive of the vulnerable and more attuned to building people’s capacities and improving the productivity of their work. The strategy lays out ways to deepen the Bank’s involvement, capacity, knowledge, and impact in social protection and labor.
Mozambique has experienced sustained poverty reduction in the last two decades, from 68 percent in 1997 to 48.4 percent in 2015, however, absolute poverty and inequality continue to increase. In 2015, there were 12.3 million people living under the basic needs poverty line, and more than 7.9 million living in extreme poverty (31.1% of total population). Moreover, Mozambique’s recent economic, fiscal, and climate crises decelerated the economy, and are likely to have further deteriorated the socio-economic situation, especially of the poor. These developments not only pose serious threats to the gains in poverty reduction but are likely to have effects on food security, access to basic social services that could affect human capital investments and outcome. This emphasizes the need to strengthen the SP system to enhance consumption smoothing, investments in human capital, increase resilience to shocks, and to foster economic recovery and prosperity for the poorest.
Poverty in the country is geographically concentrated and social protection programs coverage has made uneven progress. More than 56 percent of people living in rural areas cannot cover their basic needs, while 35 percent live under the food poverty line, in urban areas this is 32 and 22 percent respectively. Poverty rates also vary widely across provinces. Three provinces in the northern part of the country have historically held the highest poverty rates in the country, namely Niassa (66.7 percent respectively), Nampula (64.8 percent), and Zambezia (61.8 percent). On the other hand, Maputo City has a 3.8 poverty rate. Besides this uneven incidence, poverty reduction in the country has experienced a faster pace in urban areas indicating the sustained economic growth has not been pro-poor. The depth of poverty as well as the disparities across different areas in the country pose important challenges for the Government of Mozambique (GoM) in terms of prioritizing SP interventions.
The National Institute of Social Action (INAS), under the policy guidance of the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Action (MGCAS), is presently implementing three social safety net programs: (i) a social pension (PSSB) covering about 375,000 individuals; (ii) a productive safety net program (PASP) for households with able bodied members covering 97,000 households; and (iii) the Direct Social Support Program (PASD) which has two components, a multiform in-kind support, and a Post-Emergency Cash Transfer program (PASD-PE) covering 18,500 households in selected drought-affected districts. In addition, the Government has designed other interventions for targeted groups such as the child grant program for children under 2 years of age currently piloting with support from UNICEF and supported by the UN Joint Programme for Social Protection (UNJP).
In addition, with support from development partners,2 INAS has made significant progress in modernizing its system instruments. INAS developed and is utilizing the integrated management information system (known as e-INAS) which provides the platform for registration, socioeconomic evaluation, case management, and payment of beneficiaries, features that are critical for scale up of programs, better monitoring, enhanced transparency and accountability. Second, INAS with support from the MGCAS has been working towards the gradual outsourcing of payments to beneficiaries covering now the Provinces of Gaza and Nampula. Finally, INAS is seeking to further harmonize processes and procedures across SP programs, such as the M&E, and grievance redress mechanism (GRM).
The SPJ team also is implementing an operation under the Youth and Employment State Secretariat that support access to social services, employment and earnings opportunities for targeted youth. This operation aims to support the human capital development of adolescent youths in an integrated manner by increasing demand for schooling and sexual and reproductive health services.
The WB Social Protection and Jobs (SPJ) team in Mozambique aims at supporting the Government in operationalizing the National Social Protection Strategy (ENSSB) and contributing to its two main goals: increasing coverage of social protection programs in the country and increasing their efficiency.
The WB funded Social Safety Nets (SSN) Project supports the building of the basic blocks for the SP system in Mozambique, including but not limited to targeting system, a single registry, a payment system, and MIS. In addition the SSN Project supports the implementation of the PASP and PASD-PE. WB’s social protection engagement has broadened during last years and the Bank is now an active member of the Social Action Working Group (SAWG) composed by Government institutions, donors and civil society.
WB and donor partners setup a programmatic Multi-Donor Trust Fund (MDTF, P169768) to expand and strengthen the country’s social safety nets programs and instruments in Mozambique. The MDTF is managed by the World Bank and is supported by Department for International Development (DFID), the Netherlands, and Sweden. This MDTF plays a critical role in convening development actors to support the Government in enhancing the social protection system, through both increased financing and technical assistance. Furthermore, this instrument is expected to serve as a bridge to future WB and donor financing, thus broadening the World Bank’s engagement in the SPJ agenda, moving from the current public works focus to a broader agenda that includes strengthening human capital resilience of the poor using cash transfers, social pensions and other instruments.
The SPJ Global Practice is seeking a Social Protection Extended Term Consultant to support social protection and jobs operations and analytical studies in Mozambique with a specific focus on Social Protection IT/MIS. To this end, the Consultant is expected to bring excellent technical and analytical skills on social protection topics.
The Social Protection ETC will support the Social Protection and jobs team in managing and implementing Project and Analytical across the SPJ in Mozambique.
Note: The selected candidate will be offered a one-year appointment, renewable for an additional one year, at the discretion of the World Bank Group, and subject to a lifetime maximum ET Appointment of two years. If an ET appointment ends before a full year, it is considered as a full year toward the lifetime maximum. Former and current ET staff who have completed all or any portion of their second-year ET appointment are not eligible for future ET appointments.
UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives....
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