The role of the Vaccine & Cold Chain Management Expert Consultant involves supporting Centres of Excellence (CoEs) and partner countries globally to manage and significantly improve their national immunization supply chain systems. The core function of this consultancy is to enhance supply chain resilience, efficiency, and governance to ensure effective vaccine delivery.
Key activities include supporting countries in planning and executing Extended Vaccine Management Assessments (EVMAs), developing and implementing Continuous Improvement Plans (cIPs), mobilizing resources essential for vaccine and cold chain management, and ensuring the establishment of a functional, well-governed National Logistics Working Group (NLWG).
Scope of Work
The consultant will be responsible for the following tasks:
- Support countries in developing the timeline outlining the key steps for the EVM exercise from planning to finalization. This includes country facility codification, country set up, assessment creation and planning, data collection, analysis, and development of a costed EVM cIP.
- Support countries in conducting full/national or targeted EVMAs.
- Organize and conduct the training of core facilitators teams and Assessors/data collectors (F2F and virtual training).
- Provide follow-up support to managers and assessors/data collectors, supervise the implementation of the assessment, and support data analysis, data quality assurance, and the EVMA report writing.
- Using the Supply Chain Continuous Improvement Plans (SCIP) Tool, support countries in developing the Continuous Improvement Plan (cIP). This includes conducting a pre-cIP workshop situational analysis/desk review, facilitating the cIP workshop, and providing post-workshop support to country stakeholders to finalize, fully cost, and obtain endorsement for the cIP.
- Support countries to update, monitor, and report on cIP implementation using the SCIP tool.
- Support supply chain costing, budgeting, funds allocation, disbursement (with linkages to National Immunization Strategy - NIS), and utilize this information for resource mobilization efforts.
- Strengthen National Logistics Working Group (NLWG) functionality and governance.
- Support stock performance monitoring, stock data analytics, and data usage for planning and decision-making at the NLWG/EPI level.
- Support subnational vaccine requirement/forecasting analysis, triangulate target population data, coverage targets, and forecasted demand to inform decision-making.
Qualifications
Candidates must possess a BA/BSc/HND qualification in a relevant field. Success in this Expert Pool role necessitates extensive prior professional experience in vaccine supply chain management and technical consultancy.