Consultant: Access to Sexual and Reproductive Health

Purpose of Consultancy

Review of lessons learned from costing, budgeting and financing for adolescents and youth sexual and reproductive health within the national development context.

Context:

If East and Southern Africa is to achieve its Demographic Dividend and the Sustainable Development Goals for universal access to sexual and reproductive health (SRHR), there is an urgent need for Governments to increase investment in ASRHR to improve the health and wellbeing of adolescents. 

While the importance of such investments has been translated into policies and strategies for adolescent sexual and reproductive health in most East and Southern Africa countries and some have been costed, a preliminary review of the strategies shows that that costing has not been done systematically or have not been followed up with investment cases and advocacy to ensure the sufficient allocation of resources to support the implementation of these strategies.

Aiming to accelerate implementation of global and regional commitments for universal access to adolescent SRHR through increased investment within national budgets, UNFPA ESARO will partner with WHO, UNICEF and UNAIDS on a review of provisions for adolescent sexual and reproductive health in national SRHR, ASHR and/or related strategies and plans, including RMNCAH, school health and CSE strategies, implementation plans, their costing, budget allocations, and expenditure reports in five countries in East and Southern Africa.

Goal: Review of lessons learned from costing, budgeting and financing for adolescents and youth sexual and reproductive health within the national development context.

Study Objectives:

The consultant will:

• To identify and review the extent to which the national RMNCAH, ASRHR, school health and CSE strategies and plans reflect the SRHR needs of adolescents, as defined in the ICPD Programme of Action, the Lancet-Guttmacher Commission on SRHR and the SADC SRHR Strategy or the EAC RMNCAH/SRHR strategy (depending on the country under review) in five of the ten countries that are supported under the 2gether 4SRHR and SYP Programmes;
• To assess the extent to which the above strategies and plans have been costed, the methodologies and tools used for this, and how the costed strategies have been used to inform annual budgeting and resource allocation in national sector budgets;
• To identify systems for expenditure tracking for ASRHR, if available;
• To identify key gaps and challenges in costing, budgeting, financial allocations and expenditure tracking for adolescent and youth SRHR in relevant sector plans and budgets; and
• To make recommendations on how to strengthen costing, development of investment cases and advocacy efforts to increase the allocation of resources for ASRH in national health sector plans and related budgets.

Interest of the study:

The findings and recommendations from the review will be used to strengthen national advocacy efforts for increased investment in adolescent and young people’s SRHR and inform the development of a guidance for countries in costing and developing investment case studies to increase budgetary allocations in support of ASRHR within the context of universal health coverage.

Duration and working schedule: This work will require 30 working days over a period of four months. The contract will start on 06 August and end on 30 November 2019.

Place where services are to be delivered:    This is a home-based assignment.

Delivery dates and how work will be delivered:

The consultant is expected to:

• Prepare an inception report outlining the approach to the assignment, the methodologies, assessment tools and participate in an inception meeting with UNFPA and key partners (2 days);Collate and review national SRHR, RMNCAH, adolescent health and/or adolescent sexual and reproductive health, education, and youth strategies, action plans and national sector plans in the five countries under review (10 days);
• Review costing methodologies, budgets and expenditure reports for the above mentioned strategies, action plans and nationals sector plans in the five countries and identify key challenges and gaps (10 days);
• Develop a regional report (4 days) with:
  
  • Key findings of the extent to which national RMNCAH, SRHR, ASHR, CSE, and school health strategies, action plans and national health sector plans align to the ICPD PoA, 2018 Lancet Guttmacher Commission Report; the SADC SRHR Strategy or the EAC RMNCAH/SRHR strategy, and relevant global guidance;
  • Identification of key gaps and challenges in costing, financing/investment and expenditure tracking for adolescent and youth SRHR;
  • Recommendations and guidance for introduction/strengthening of methodologies to costing, development of investment cases and strengthen budget advocacy for ASRHR within the integrated SRHR package as defined in the ICPD Programme of Action, the Lancet-Guttmacher Commission on SRHR and the SADC SRHR strategy/ EAC RMNCAH/SRHR strategy.
• Prepare a presentation outlining the key findings and recommendations from the review (1 day);
• Facilitate the online/virtual validation process and present key review findings to key regional and national stakeholders including SADC, EAC, relevant UN agencies and Government partners (1 day);
• Incorporate the inputs from the validation process and revise the draft documents (1 day);
• Guide and respond to queries from the proof-reader/editor and designer (1 day).

Delivery dates:

• The inception report will be delivered by 15 August 2019.
• The zero draft report will be delivered by 30 September 2019.
• The first draft report will be delivered by 31 October 2019.
• The final report and a ppt with summary of findings will be delivered by 30 November 2019.

Expected travel:  No travel is expected.

Required Qualifications and Experience

• A university degree, at minimum at Masters level or equivalent in health economy, health financing, public health or equivalent;
• Minimum of 10 years of professional experience with proven expertise in health system strengthening, health policy and planning, health economics, or a related area;
• Technical experience in undertaking costings, expenditure analysis etc. related to public health;
• Experience in SRHR, adolescent sexual and reproductive sexual, reproductive, maternal, child, and adolescent health policy, strategy and implementation plan development;
• A good understanding of the adolescent SRHR situation and evidence based programming in the East and Southern Africa region;
• Excellent research and writing skills with a documented publication track record;
• Experience in working with Governments, RECs, UN agencies or similar bodies;
• Reliable, creative and able to work with little supervision;
• Proven experience in working with a wide range of partners and reaching consensus and accommodating their critical inputs into the process;
• Excellent English writing skills.

HOW TO APPLY:

Interested candidates should submit their CV and cover letter to the email address delate@unfpa.org with copy to takawira@unfpa.org at latest by 10 July 2019.