Job Purpose
The Asia-Pacific region is one of the most disaster-prone in the world. In recent years, the frequency and intensity of hazards have increased, exacerbated by climate and environmental crises. To strengthen community resilience, National Societies have been working with nature for years in a variety of ways: improving food security, generating income, hazard mitigation measures. However, these activities often feel disjointed and lack a coherent vision, hindering our ability to understand their collective impact on the community resilience landscape in Asia Pacific. Without a clear vision of how different initiatives contribute to the bigger picture, it has been difficult to visualise change, measure progress, identify areas for improvement and optimise our collective efforts.
It is necessary to take stock of past and current initiatives involving nature undertaken by National Societies in the Asia Pacific region and to set common goals to join forces and increase our regional impact.
The consultant "National societies working with nature, Mapping and way forward in Asia Pacific" , in collaboration with the IFRC APRO Regional DRR coordinator and the British Red Cross (BRC) Regional DRR coordinator, is responsible for mapping the work with nature in the region up to 2024 in order to help RCRC National Societies in Asia Pacific as well as IFRC and international and national partners to understand the past and current status of the effort undertaken at national and regional level. Building on the mapping, the consultant will accompany representatives from selected National Societies to define a regional roadmap 2025-2030 that will frame their ambitions for the next 5 years and support the National Societies position themselves as key players in the region. National Societies participation to this mission is voluntary but the action is expected to involve between 6 to 12 National Societies of the region.
Job Duties And Responsibilities
The consultant "National societies working with nature, Mapping and way forward in Asia Pacific" will be responsible for the following specific tasks:
Coordination, Communication And Collaboration
- To liaising with IFRC and BRC to define the approach, agree on the outputs and monitor progress, the consultant will discuss with the DRR coordinator ‘s at regular intervals about the work and in case of any clarifications, the DRR coordinator will provide the required information.
- To identify and engage, upon IFRC DRR coordinator‘s approval, with the RCRC movement key units and individuals at national, regional, and global level that could benefit and provide valuable inputs regarding the mission.
Technical Support
- To conduct a desk review to assess existing material at global, regional, and national level, and identify existing RCRC approaches in the region implemented by National Societies and have a preliminary vision of National Societies capacities, needs and interest toward Nature related activities,
- To design and conduct a regional online survey to map the Asia Pacific National Societies experiences in working with nature: structuring and categorizing the information to collect, the medium to use, the data analysis that will be available, for which purpose taking in consideration the confidentiality aspects.
- To conduct key informant interviews with selected key stakeholders among RCRC National Societies in Asia Pacific as well as IFRC and international and national partners
- To design a 3-to-4-day “Setting regional ambitions of nature approaches within the RCRC” workshop based on the learnings from the mapping, aiming at exchanging on lessons learnt, challenges and opportunities and setting ambitions, targets and action plan for the RCRC National Societies in Asia Pacific work with nature. The workshop will be structured around various themes to be defined (ie: Data, tools and assessments, mainstreaming NbS, Policy engagement and awareness building, etc…) and will rely on various co-creation methods to be defined.
Knowledge Management And Learning
- To facilitate the 3-to-4-day Setting regional ambitions of nature approaches within the RCRC” workshop on the ambitions to work with nature with selected committed national society representatives.
- Prepare report to summarise findings in the 2024 Regional mapping of the status of nature approaches within the RCRC and develop the 2025-2030 Regional ambitions of nature approaches within the RCRC considering role, mandate, scale, stakeholders, and governance in order to make an impact.