UNDP Jobs - 97699- Development of a technical paper on Procurement of

Development of a technical paper on Procurement of health technologies for Neglected Tropical Diseases

Location :

Home based

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

15-Apr-2021

Application Deadline :

30-Mar-21 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

30 working days

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

30 working days

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

UNDP is the knowledge frontier organization for sustainable development in the UN Development System and serves as the integrator for collective action to realize the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). UNDP’s policy work carried out at HQ, Regional and Country Office levels forms a contiguous spectrum of deep local knowledge to cutting-edge global perspectives and advocacy. In this context, UNDP invests in the Global Policy Network (GPN), a network of field-based and global technical expertise across a wide range of knowledge domains and in support of the signature solutions and organizational capabilities envisioned in the Strategic Plan.

Within the GPN, the Bureau for Policy and Programme Support (BPPS) has the responsibility for developing all relevant policy and guidance to support the results of UNDP’s Strategic Plan. BPPS’s staff provides technical advice to Country Offices; advocates for UNDP corporate messages, represents UNDP at multi-stakeholder fora including public-private dialogues, government, and civil society dialogues, and engages in UN inter-agency coordination in specific thematic areas. BPPS works closely with UNDP’s Crisis Bureau (CB) to support emergency and crisis response. BPPS ensures that issues of risk are fully integrated into UNDP’s development programmes. BPPS assists UNDP and partners to achieve higher quality development results through an integrated approach that links results-based management and performance monitoring with more effective and new ways of working. BPPS supports UNDP and partners to be more innovative, knowledge and data driven including in its programme support efforts.

BPPS supports UNDP’s 2018-21 Strategic Plan, focusing on 3 outcomes including advancing poverty eradication in all its forms and dimensions (outcome 1). The HIV, Health and Development Group (HHD), within BPPS, is helping to contribute towards this outcome.

UNDP is a founding cosponsor of the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), a partner of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, and a co-sponsor of several other international health partnerships. UNDP’s work on HIV, health and development, as described in the HIV, Health and Development Strategy 2016-2021: Connecting the Dots, leverages UNDP’s core strengths and mandates in human development, governance and capacity development to complement the efforts of specialist health-focused UN agencies. UNDP delivers three types of support to countries in HIV, health and development.

First, UNDP helps countries to mainstream attention to HIV and health into action on gender, poverty and the broader effort to achieve and sustain the Sustainable Development Goals. For example, UNDP works with countries to understand the social and economic factors that play a crucial role in driving health and disease, and to respond to such dynamics with appropriate policies and programmes outside the health sector. UNDP also promotes specific action on the needs and rights of women and girls as they relate to HIV.

Second, UNDP works with partners to address the interactions between governance, human rights and health responses. Sometimes this is done through focused or specialized programmes, such as promoting attention to the role of the law and legal environments in facilitating stronger HIV responses, including the use of flexibilities in intellectual property law to lower the cost of drugs and diagnostics. UNDP also works to empower and include marginalized populations who are disproportionately affected by HIV, such as sex workers, men who have sex with men and people living with HIV. Beyond these focused efforts, UNDP plays a key role in ensuring attention to HIV and health within broader governance and rights initiatives, including support to municipal action on SDGs, sustainable responses for Health and HIV such as improving sustainability of AIDS financing, sustainable health procurement, strengthening of national human rights institutions and increasing access to justice for key populations.

Third, as a trusted, long-term partner with extensive operational experience, UNDP supports countries in effective implementation of complex, multilateral and multisectoral health projects, while simultaneously investing in capacity development so that national and local partners can assume these responsibilities over time. The UNDP/Global Fund partnership is an important part of this work, facilitating access to resources for action on SDG 3 by countries that face constraints in directly receiving and managing such funding. UNDP partners with countries in crisis/post-crisis situations, those with weak institutional capacity or governance challenges, and countries under sanctions. When requested, UNDP acts as temporary Principal Recipient in these settings, working with national partners and the Global Fund to improve management, implementation and oversight of Global Fund grants, while simultaneously developing national capacity to be able to assume the Principal Recipient role over time.

Innovation, Access and Delivery of new health technologies for TB, Malaria and Neglected Tropical Diseases
The 2030 Agenda specifically highlights the need for synergies between the innovation of new medicines, diagnostics and vaccines, and enabling access to these health technologies; asserting that addressing innovation, access and delivery are critical for UHC in LMICs.
The majority of deaths caused by infectious disease are of poor people living in LMICs with many occurring in children under five. HIV, malaria, tuberculosis (TB) and other epidemics continue to devastate communities throughout the developing world. The prevalence of neglected tropical diseases (NTDs), endemic in 149 countries, also remains high.
Since 2013, with the support of the Government of Japan and as part of its work on accelerating progress on the SDGs, UNDP has been leading the Access and Delivery Partnership (ADP). ADP supports LMICs enhance their capacity to access, introduce and deliver new health technologies for TB, malaria and NTDs. The introduction of new health technologies can place a weighty burden on existing health systems. These burdens may include new requirements for drug regulation, supply and distribution, and health personnel training. New health technologies are broadly defined as drugs, diagnostic tools and vaccines that are relevant for the prevention, treatment or cure of TB, malaria and NTDs, but have not yet been introduced in LMICs. The ADP focuses on strengthening the capacity of LMIC stakeholders to facilitate the development of the systems and processes required to effectively access new health technologies and introduce them to the patients in need. Led and coordinated by UNDP, the ADP is a unique collaboration among UNDP, WHO, the Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases at the World Health Organization (TDR) and PATH. Working together, the partners leverage the expertise within each organization to provide the full range of technical skills necessary to strengthen capacity in LMICs.
In furtherance of these joint objectives, the GHIT Fund promotes partnerships between Japanese research organizations and international entities to foster the development of new global health technologies for TB, Malaria, NTDs and other diseases. The first five years of collaboration have been focused on two sides of the same coin: driving health technology innovation, on the one hand, and strengthening health systems to promote access and delivery, on the other.
Uniting Efforts for Innovation, Access and Delivery
As part of the ADP scale up phase, the Government of Japan, UNDP-ADP and the Global Health Innovative Technology (GHIT) Fund in January 2019 launched a global Platform that aims to facilitate engagement for health technology access and delivery preparedness among funders, PDPs, private sector, research institutes and access and delivery stakeholders (defined in this context to be entities involved in the selection, purchasing, procurement, implementation and use of health technologies). The platform was launched at an inaugural and first global dialogue in January 2019 in Bangkok.
The global Platform - Uniting Efforts for Innovation, Access and Delivery - aims at creating spaces for collaboration and building of synergies in seeking to systematically address bottlenecks that impede the efficient uptake of new health technologies, as well as facilitating the exchange of information that can help identify major common challenges as well as best practices, opportunities and successful strategies in technology innovation, introduction and uptake that can enable the three partners and others to identify and act on strategies to improve access and delivery of health technologies for neglected patients. The Platform focuses on health technologies for neglected diseases and patients, including neglected tropical diseases (NTDs). For more information: https://www.unitingeffortsforhealth.org/
The first year of this platform brought together partners and experts to define a common agenda for health technology access and delivery preparedness in LMICs, and the identification of key areas for the Uniting Efforts Platform to explore further, including strategies to improve financing/funding for access and delivery, and planning for access and delivery within R&D.
As part of the workplan for 2021, the Uniting Efforts partners would like to host a technical webinar and develop a technical document on strategies to improve the procurement of health technologies for neglected tropical diseases.

Duties and Responsibilities

The objective of this assignment is to support the research and writing of a technical paper on strategies to improve the procurement of health technologies for neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) and to help facilitate a technical webinar on the subject. The aim is to have an understanding of the status quo on needs and opportunities for the procurement of health technologies for neglected tropical diseases, identify experiences by others diseases and priorities, including lessons learned and best practices, and explore opportunities for change or for further dialogue or analysis to improve access to health technologies for NTDs.

The consultancy has three main deliverables and phases:

Phase I: Prepare a short background context analysis on the current status of the procurement of heath technologies (Medicines, diagnostic tools and vaccines) for neglected tropical diseases (NTDs). The backgrounder should focus on NTDs but also look at the lessons learned on the global and national procurement strategies for other global health priorities, like TB, malaria, HIV in comparison. The review will include a literature review of the existing situation, policies and practices. Due to the diversity of diseases and products, the review could provide at least 3 specific (disease or product specific) case studies of procurement pathways.
Phase II: Support the convening of a small and virtual technical meeting where experts on procurement and access strategies for LMICS would share experiences from their respective fields, discuss challenges and lessons leant, and propose opportunities to improve the procurement of health technologies for neglected tropical diseases. The consultant will be expected to support the convening of the technical meeting (e.g. preparing list of key participants and agenda) and present the findings of the background context analysis review (Phase I work) as a backdrop to the technical discussions.
Phase III: Produce a Uniting Efforts technical report (Knowledge Product) with recommendations on strategies to improve procurement of health technologies for neglected tropical diseases based on Phase I work on the background research and inputs from the technical webinar (Phase II). The final report (Approximately 10,000 words) will describe and analyze current practices, policies and approaches to procurement, analyze the challenges, highlight the successes and propose solutions and/or alternative procurement pathways that could be explored by countries, procurement entities (global, national, local), product developers for healthcare products for neglected diseases, PDPs, and funders.

The consultant will be expected to attend and prepare a presentation of the final technical paper/knowledge product at a Uniting Efforts launch event that will be virtual or in person depending on the evolution of the current COVID-19 pandemic.

Competencies

Corporate

Demonstrates integrity by modelling the UN’s values and ethical standards.
Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP.
Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.
Treats all people fairly without favoritism
Fulfils all obligations to gender sensitivity and zero tolerance for sexual harassment.

Functional

Strong research, analytical, writing, and communication skills, including ability to produce high quality technical reports and knowledge products,
Ability to work independently, produce high quality outputs in a timely manner.
Professional experience working in global health and procurement of health/medical products.
Knowledge of LMIC and LICs procurement dynamics (Challenges, barriers and opportunities)

Required Skills and Experience

I. Academic Qualification:

Masters Degree (or equivalent qualification) in health-related field, and/or in procurement of health-related products.

II. Experience:

Minimum of five (5) years of relevant work experience in procurement or procurement policies of medicines, vaccines and other health technologies for diseases that predominantly affect the poor and developing countries.
Demonstrated experience in conducting research, providing technical support and/or writing reports on global health and/or access to health technologies.
Knowledge and experience working with UNDP and/or other UN agency.
Demonstrated experience in procurement of health/medical products for LMICs and LICs or low-resource settings. Knowledge of the procurement needs and context for NTDs would be an asset.

III. Language Requirements

Fluency in written and spoken English, including the ability to write concisely and professionally, is required.

SCOPE OF PRICE PROPOSAL AND SCHEDULE OF PAYMENTS

All proposals must be expressed as lumpsum amount for each of the three deliverables identified above, and a total lumpsum. This amount must be “all-inclusive”. Please note that the terms “all-inclusive” implies that all costs (professional fees, living allowances, communications, consumables, etc.) that could possibly be incurred are already factored into the final amounts submitted in the proposal.

Payment:

Payments will be made on lumpsum basis and in accordance with the schedule below and upon submission of a certification of payment (CoP) form duly certified and confirmation by the reporting manager of satisfactory performance of achieved work (deliverables/outputs) in line with the schedule of payments hereunder.

Up to 25% of total contract amount upon completion of phase I - submission to UNDP and approval of the background context analysis document.
Up to 25% of total contract amount upon competition of phase II- Presentation at the technical webinar.
Remaining 50% of total contract amount upon competition of phase III- submission to UNDP and approval of the final knowledge product on procurement.