Terms of Reference 

 Background 

The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) is a private, nonprofit, tax-exempt U.S. organization, founded in 1895, that saves wildlife by understanding critical problems, developing science-based solutions, and taking conservation action that benefits nature and humanity. With over a century of experience, long-term commitments in dozens of landscapes, a presence in more than 60 countries, and a track record of creating more than 150 protected areas worldwide, WCS has accumulated the biological knowledge, cultural understanding, and partnerships needed to ensure that wild places and wildlife thrive alongside local communities. Working with local communities and organizations, this knowledge is applied to address species, habitat, and ecosystem management issues critical to improving livelihoods that depend on the direct use of natural resources. 

Position Summary 

WCS is a GCF Readiness Delivery Partner (DP) in support of the DRC’s National Designated Authority (NDA), the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development (MEDD) as part of this work. WCS is seeking a highly qualified and motivated gender expert to contribute to developing the 30×30 strategy in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The consultant will perform the Environmental and Social screening, and design and draft the required environmental and social safeguard plans that will be part of the GCF concept note developed as part of the project. 

Technical Focus 

The incumbent will ensure compliance of the projects with the Environmental and Social Standards (ESS) of donors and WCS. 

Tasks and responsibilities 

In coordination with WCS safeguards team, the consultant will: 

• ensure the update of environmental and social safeguards (ESS) instruments such as ESCP, ESMF, PMP, RPF, LMP, SEP, GBV action plan, Grievance Redress Mechanism (GRM), Social Inclusion, and Citizen Engagement in collaboration with partners. 

• ensure the disclosure, implementation, and compliance of safeguards instruments, sustainable performance, and quality assurance of all safeguards through project site visits and formulation of appropriate mitigation measures. 

• strengthening the technical capacity of the local safeguards team on safeguard implementation through continuous training and coaching. 

• coordinate the environmental and social impact assessment exercise of sub-projects to check the activity is permissible (as per the legal and regulatory requirements of the projects); determine the level of environmental and social assessment required based on the level of expected impacts and establish where ESMP will be required, providing estimate costs of implementation. 

• coordinate the monitoring and reporting of safeguards tools during the project implementation to ensure the safeguards performance is regularly reported. 

• compile information from quarterly reports received related to safeguards to feed in the six-month report. 

• lead the compilation of pre-implementation environmental and social safeguard documents before the implementation of activities, which include a description of the implementing sites, the activities to be carried out, aggregated results of the environmental and social screening checklists for the Environmental and Social Management Plans identifying mitigation measures, indicators, responsibilities, and timeframe. 

• supervise the establishment of adequate multiple access points to receive complaints from stakeholders, ensure they are known to beneficiaries, and act as focal points to receive and file claims accordingly and monitor the effectiveness of the access points, proposing any improvement needed to resolve and handle complaints at the site. 

• communicate to the GCF Program Coordinator and guide on addressing concerns brought to the attention of the focal points regarding any safeguard issues due to subproject activities 

Minimum Requirements 

• At least a master’s degree in environmental studies, international development, social science, economy, or related fields. 

• At least 10 years of professional experience in environmental and social safeguards management, including experience in climate-change projects, preferably with funding from a multilateral donor. 

• Extensive experience with stakeholder engagement processes focusing on target geographies. 

• Proven experience in conducting interviews with representative stakeholders (private sector, governmental agencies, IPs and LCs, civil society, academia and research agencies, etc.) 

• Strong ability to develop a synthetic document, summarizing lessons learned and providing recommendations that will feed into a knowledge product. 

• Experience in developing GCF environmental and social screening will be strongly desired. 

• Ability to work in both French and English 

Selection Criteria 

As WCS is an equal opportunity employer committed to recruiting and supporting a diverse workforce (qualified women and people from all ethnic backgrounds), interested candidates are invited to submit their CV, a cover letter outlining relevant experience, and a sample of a gender strategy or similar document developed for a previous project. Please send applications to wcsdrcongorecruitment@wcs.org by December 11, 2024. 

Application deadline: December 11th, 2024, at 11.59 Goma time.