Emergency Response Coordinator, CSTII, Lusaka Zambia The Republic

## Emergency Response Coordinator, CSTII, Lusaka - Organization:WFP - World Food Programme - Office:WFP in Lusaka, Zambia 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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To learn more about WFP, visit our website: https://www.wfp.org and follow us on social media to keep up with our latest news: YouTube, LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok. - WFP is a 2020 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. - WFP offers a highly inclusive, diverse, and multicultural working environment. - WFP invests in the personal & professional development of its employees through a range of training, accreditation, coaching, mentorship, and other programs as well as through internal mobility opportunities. - A career path in WFP provides an exciting opportunity to work across the various country, regional and global offices around the world, and with passionate colleagues who work tirelessly to ensure that effective humanitarian assistance reaches millions of people across the globe. - We offer an attractive compensation package (please refer to theTerms and Conditionssection of this vacancy announcement). BACKGROUND AND ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT: Zambia is facing an elevated risk of significant food security impacts associated with the forecasted 2026/27 El Niño event. Current regional analysis identifies Southern Africa as particularly exposed to reduced rainfall during the main November-March rainy season, with food security impacts expected to develop progressively following the end of the agricultural season and subsequent lean season period. Zambia enters this period following a strong 2025/26 agricultural season and record maize harvest, creating an important window for early preparedness and strategic use of available national food supplies. At the same time, the evolving El Niño outlook presents significant risks to the 2026/27 agricultural season and subsequent food security situation. Zambia's current planning scenario anticipates a progression from preparedness and anticipatory action through assessment and repositioning to potential scaled response and recovery, with humanitarian needs potentially peaking during the 2027/28 lean season. The response will require strong coordination across programme, RAM, supply chain, finance, partnerships, communications, field operations and other functions, as well as close engagement with Government, cooperating partners, UN agencies, donors and regional and corporate WFP structures. Lessons from Zambia's 2023/24 El Niño response demonstrate the importance of early and coherent decisions on targeting, transfer modalities and transfer values; strong Government and inter-agency coordination; evidence and analytics; logistics readiness; and timely resource mobilization. Against this background, WFP Zambia seeks an experienced Emergency Coordinator to provide dedicated coordination and strategic-operational oversight of the Country Office's El Niño preparedness and response. PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNMENT The Emergency Coordinator will provide overall coordination of WFP Zambia's El Niño preparedness and response, ensuring that analysis, programme decisions, operational planning, supply chain and delivery arrangements, resources, partnerships and implementation are brought together into a coherent, sequenced and actionable Country Office response. The coordinator will serve as the central point connecting management, SO1 and other programme teams, RAM, Supply Chain, Finance, Partnerships, Communications, Field Offices and other functions, ensuring that strategic decisions are translated into clear actions, responsibilities, milestones and deliverables. The incumbent will lead the development and maintenance of the Concept of Operations (CONOPS) and integrated response plan and calendar; oversee the Emergency Task Force; support management decision-making; and ensure WFP's response continuously adapts to evolving evidence, Government and UN Country Team priorities, operational realities and available resources. 1. Overall Emergency Coordination and Strategic Direction: - Coordinate the Country Office's overall El Niño preparedness and response architecture, ensuring coherence across preparedness, anticipatory action, disaster risk financing, emergency response, social protection, early recovery and relevant resilience interventions. - Advise the Country Office Management Team (CMT) on emerging strategic and operational issues, risks, priorities, decision points and required management action. - Maintain a whole-of-operation view, ensuring that decisions across programme, supply chain, resources, partnerships and implementation remain aligned and that critical gaps and bottlenecks are identified and escalated early. 2. CONOPS, Response Planning and Milestone Management: - Lead the development, regular updating and operationalization of the Country Office El Niño Concept of Operations (CONOPS) and integrated response plan, articulating scenarios, objectives, targeting, interventions, transfer modalities and values, operational arrangements, geographic priorities, scale, resources and implementation sequencing. - Develop and maintain an integrated emergency calendar and critical-path tracker covering key preparedness, assessment, programme, supply chain, partnership, funding and implementation milestones. - Translate the CONOPS into clear actions, owners, timelines and decision points and systematically follow up implementation across functions. 3. Emergency Task Force and Cross-Functional Coordination: - Chair and coordinate the Country Office Emergency El Niño Task Force, ensuring regular, decision-oriented meetings with clear agendas, actions, accountabilities and follow-up. - Bring together SO1 and other programme teams, RAM, Supply Chain, CBT, Finance, Partnerships, Communications, Security, TEC, Field Offices and other relevant functions around a common operational picture and agreed response priorities. - Identify cross-functional dependencies and bottlenecks and drive their resolution, escalating matters requiring senior management decisions. - Ensure information from different functions is synthesized into clear operational implications and actionable recommendations, rather than remaining in parallel technical workstreams. 4. Evidence, Analysis and Programme Decision-Making: - Work closely with the Research Assessment and Monitoring (RAM) unit and relevant technical teams to ensure that WFP's response is continuously informed by the best available evidence, including seasonal and climate forecasts, market and price monitoring, IPC/VAC analysis, hotspot analysis, vulnerability assessments, crop and harvest assessments and other food security information. - Translate analytical products into practical recommendations for geographic and household targeting, caseloads, intervention design, modality selection, t