Programme Policy Officer (School Feeding) - CSTII, Aden Yemen The Republic

## Programme Policy Officer (School Feeding) - CSTII, Aden, Yemen - Organization:WFP - World Food Programme - Office:WFP Aden, Yemen DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS WFP celebrates and embraces diversity. It is committed to the principle of equal employment opportunity for all its employees and encourages qualified candidates to apply irrespective of race, colour, national origin, ethnic or social background, genetic information, gender, gender identity and/or expression, sexual orientation, religion or belief, HIV status or disability. The World Food Programme is the world's largest humanitarian organization saving lives in emergencies and using food assistance to build a pathway to peace, stability and prosperity, for people recovering from conflict, disasters and the impact of climate change. 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GENERAL INFORMATIONJOB TITLE:Programme Policy officer (School Feeding)TYPE OF CONTRACT/LEVEL:Consultancy Contract CSTIISUPERVISOR:Programme OfficerUNIT/DIVISION:ProgrammeDUTY STATION (City, Country):Aden, Yemen The Government of Yemen and WFP are actively working to sustain and transition the national school feeding portfolio into a highly strategic mechanism that supports child nutrition, local agrifood value chains, educational equity, and long-term community resilience. WFP Yemen's operations are undergoing a critical strategic shift aligned with the new Interim Country Strategic Plan (ICSP 2027-2029). This shift focuses on scaling up shock-responsive Home-Grown School Feeding (HGSF) models and Healthy Kitchens, while deliberately moving away from emergency hand-outs toward national systems-building. Central to this strategy is the structured, phased operational and fiscal transition and eventual handover of the program to the Ministry of Education (MoE) and other national counterparts. In an environment marked by deep resource constraints and currency bifurcation, this portfolio redefines the institutional roles of both WFP and the state. This is achieved by embedding robust capacity-strengthening frameworks, linking local smallholder producer cooperatives directly to school meals demand, and utilizing innovative financing instruments such as the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) Multiplier Grant and global platforms like the School Meals Coalition to secure a self-sustaining national program. To provide senior-level technical leadership, high-level policy advice, and strategic oversight for the design, scale-up, and institutional transition of WFP Yemen's school feeding portfolio. The Senior Consultant will lead the implementation of the new ICSP HGSF expansion, manage the technical committee structures tasked with the phased handover of field operations and incentive structures to the Ministry of Education payroll, and drive comprehensive national institutional capacity-strengthening initiatives to ensure programmatic continuity and sovereign ownership. ACCOUNTABILITIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES: A. Technical Leadership, HGSF Scaling, and Institutional Transition - Strategic ICSP Alignment: Provide overarching technical leadership for WFP Yemen's school feeding portfolio, managing the strategic pivot from emergency in-kind distributions to nutrition-sensitive, shock-responsive Home-Grown School Feeding (HGSF) and Healthy Kitchen delivery models. - National Handover Framework: Architect and guide the execution of the operational and fiscal transition roadmap to systematically transfer field implementation, data management, and operational incentive costs from WFP direct funding onto the national MoE civil service payroll and budget lines. - Agrifood Value-Chain Integration: Provide expert guidance on establishing community-based local procurement networks and institutional market linkages. This involves connecting smallholder farmer cooperatives, particularly female-led producer groups, directly to school feeding kitchens to tackle local economic vulnerabilities. - Standards & Quality Control: Formulate and enforce strict standard operating procedures (SOPs), food safety and quality management protocols, nutrition-sensitive menu guidelines, and localized supply chain tracking tools for the expanded Healthy Kitchen platforms. - Inter-Ministerial Coordination: Manage and facilitate high-level coordination committees across the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Public Health and Population (MoPHP), Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor (MOSAL), and local governorate authorities to secure institutional alignment on transition milestones. - Social Behavior Change: Oversee the design and deployment of integrated, nutrition-sensitive Social and Behavior Change Communication (SBCC) toolkits targeting students, local school boards, parents, and catering staff to maximize community ownership. B. Evidence Generation, Macro-Fiscal Policy, and Innovative Financing - Investment Case Development: Lead the production of high-level policy briefs, multi-sectoral investment cases, and analytical evidence products to demonstrate the socio-economic return on investment of school meals to senior government stakeholders, international financial institutions (IFIs), and bilateral donors. - Value-for-Money Analysis: Design and oversee comprehensive Value for Money (VfM) tracking, fiscal cost-effectiveness studies, and rapid diagnostic assessments to optimize institutional delivery systems during the transition phase. - Resource Mobilization: Identify, design, and pursue complementary and innovative financing streams to support long-term programmatic sustainability, specifically leveraging co-financing models, the GPE Multiplier Grant, and global thematic funds. - SABER Policy Modernization: Drive the finalization, high-level endorsement, and operationalization of the Systems Approach for Better Education Results (SABER) school feeding tool, utilizing its diagnostic findings to support national legislative and regulatory policy development. C. Global Coalitions, South-South Cooperation, and Knowledge Governance - School Meals Coalition Integration: Act as WFP's primary technical adviser to the Ministry of Education to support Yemen's high-level commitments within the global School Meals Coalition, ensuring national targets are met and showcased globally. - South-South Knowledge Exchanges: Design, fundraise for, and execute targeted South-South and Triangular Cooperation (SSTC) initiatives and study visits. These will link Yemeni ministry officials with regional and international institutional counterparts experienced in executing successful sovereign HGSF transition and payroll absorption roadma