Early Childhood Development and Nutrition Expert

UNICEF is supporting health, nutrition, HIV prevention, education, access to safe drinking water, sanitation and protection for children and families caught in the conflict.

While the war-related emergency continues, Ukraine has started to orient towards recovery in the Central and Western regions to build back better and prioritize policy reform.

Within its new Country Program Document for Ukraine (CPD), UNICEF Ukraine has included Early Childhood Development (ECD) as one of three ‘Leadership Areas’ for the organization over the coming five-year UNICEF’s Strategic Plan for 2022-2025.

The ECD Leadership Area, known as Better Start to Life, is meant to serve as the ‘foundation’ for the other two ‘Leadership Areas’ - Better Care, which is anchored within Child Protection and focuses on the most vulnerable children with an emphasis on those at risk of abandonment and/or institutionalization, and prevention and Better Learning and Skills which focuses on learning loss due to COVID and the war from pre-school through adolescence.


UNICEF Ukraine's Health section has made notable progress in integrating Early Childhood Development by implementing the Nurturing Care Framework within Primary Health Care. This effort includes providing facility-based ECD services through Child-Friendly Spaces (CFS) in primary health facilities, expanding the home visiting programme, introducing child development monitoring, offering IYCF counselling, and mapping zero-dose immunised children to better understand vaccine hesitancy or refusal. The programme includes providing parenting support at health facilities and during home visits and coordinates referrals to other health, social and educational sectors.

To spearhead these efforts, UNICEF Ukraine is seeking to appoint a Nutrition and Early Childhood Development International UNV, who will be responsible for planning, implementing, and monitoring nutrition and ECD programmes in collaboration with the health and nutrition team at central level, field office health and nutrition officers, and UNICEF staff from the education, child protection, social protection and SBC sections.

The Nutrition and Early Childhood Development International UNV position is situated within the Country Office (CO) in Kyiv, Ukraine. Reporting to the Health Manager (MNCH), this role is crucial for advancing UNICEF’s strategic objectives in planning, implementing and monitoring integrated nutrition and ECD programmes within Health while ensuring cross-sectoral linkages with other sectors in UNICEF and with partners in Ukraine.

In addition to duty station-specific vaccine requirements, appointments are subject to confirmation of fully vaccinated status against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) with a World Health Organization (WHO)-endorsed vaccine, which must be met prior to taking up the appointment. It does not apply to UN Volunteers who will work remotely and are not expected to work on or visit UNICEF premises, programme delivery locations or directly interact with communities UNICEF works with, nor to travel to perform functions for UNICEF for the duration of their contracts.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for UN Volunteers with disabilities. This may include, for example, accessible software, travel assistance for missions or personal attendants. We encourage you to disclose your disability during your application in case you need reasonable accommodation during the recruitment process and afterwards in your assignment.

1. Support programme development and planning

- Support and contribute to the preparation, design and updating of the situation analysis for the sector(s) to establish a strategic plan for development, design and management of the nutrition and ECD programmes. Keep abreast of development trends to enhance programme management, efficiency and delivery.
- Promote convergence in development, management and monitoring of nutrition and ECD programmes
- Participate in strategic programme discussions on the planning of health programmes. Formulate, design and prepare a sector of the health programme proposal, ensuring alignment with UNICEF’s Strategic Plan, the Country Programme, as well as coherence/integration with the UN Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF), regional strategies, and national priorities, plans and competencies.
- Establish specific programme goals, objectives, strategies, and implementation plans based on results-based planning terminology and methodology (RBM). Prepare required documentation for programme review and approval.
- Work closely and collaboratively with colleagues and partners to discuss strategies and methodologies, and to determine national priorities and competencies to ensure the achievement of concrete and sustainable results.
- Provide technical and operational support throughout all stages of programming processes to ensure integration, coherence and harmonization of programmes/projects with other UNICEF sectors and achievement of results as planned and allocated.

2. Programme management, monitoring and delivery of results, with a focus on field implementation and ECD programming
- Plan and/or collaborate with internal and external partners to establish monitoring benchmarks, performance indicators, and other UNICEF/UN system indicators and measurements to assess and strengthen performance accountability, coherence and delivery of concrete and sustainable results for the assigned sector in health programmes.
- Participate in monitoring and evaluation exercises, programme reviews and annual sectoral reviews with the government and other counterparts to assess progress and to determine required action/interventions to achieve results.
- Prepare and assess monitoring and evaluation reports to identify gaps, strengths and/or weaknesses in programme management, identify lessons learned and use knowledge gained for development planning and timely intervention to achieve goals.
- Actively monitor programmes/projects through field visits, surveys and/or exchange of information with partners/stakeholders to assess progress, identify bottlenecks, potential problems and take timely decisions to resolve issues and/or refer to relevant officials for timely resolution.
- Monitor and verify the optimum and appropriate use of sectoral programme resources (financial, administrative and other assets), confirming compliance with organizational rules, regulations/procedures and donor commitments, standards of accountability and integrity, ensuring timely reporting and liquidation of resources.
- Prepare regular and mandated programme/project reports for management, donors and partners to keep them informed of programme progress.

3. Technical and operational support to programme implementation

- Provide technical guidance and operational support to government counterparts, NGO partners, UN system partners and other country office partners/donors on the interpretation, application and understanding of UNICEF policies, strategies, processes, and best practices and approaches on health-related issues to support programme development planning, management, implementation and delivery of results.
- Participate in discussions with national partners, clients and stakeholders to promote health and development issues, especially in the areas of gender, emergency preparedness, maternal and neonatal health, and child survival and development.
- Draft policy papers, briefs and other strategic programme materials for management use, information and consideration.
- Participate in emergency preparedness initiatives for programme development, contingency planning and/or to respond to emergencies in the country or where designated.

4. Networking and partnership building, with a focus on field implementation
- Build and sustain effective close working partnerships with health sector government counterparts, national stakeholders, as well as global partners, allies, donors, and academia. Through active networking, advocacy and effective communication, build capacity and exchange knowledge and expertise to facilitate the achievement of programme goals on child rights, social justice and equity.
- Prepare communication and information materials for the CO programme advocacy to promote awareness, establish partnerships/alliances, and support fundraising for health programmes (maternal, neonatal and child survival and development).
- Participate and/or represent UNICEF in appropriate inter-agency (UNCT) discussions and planning on health-related issues to collaborate with inter-agency partners/colleagues on the UN Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF) planning and preparation of health programmes/projects, ensuring organizational position, interests and priorities are fully considered and integrated in the the UN Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF) process in development planning and agenda setting.

5. Innovation, knowledge management and capacity building on infant and young child Feeding and ECD Programmes
- Apply and introduce innovative approaches and good practices to build the capacity of partners and stakeholders, and to support the implementation and delivery of concrete and sustainable programme results.
- Keep abreast and research to provide evidence for the implementation of best and cutting-edge practices in health.
- Assess, institutionalize and share best practices and knowledge learned.
- Contribute to the development and implementation of policies and procedures to ensure optimum efficiency and efficacy of sustainable programmes and projects.
- Organize and implement capacity building initiatives to enhance the competencies of stakeholders to promote sustainable results on health-related programmes/projects.