Position Title: C40 City Adviser, Freetown

Department: Regions

Reporting To: Regional Director for Africa

Location: Freetown, Sierra Leone

Annual Salary: XXXX 

Term: 1 year

Background 

The C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group connects more than 90 of the world’s greatest cities which have committed to tackling climate change. We bring mayors from around the world together to learn from each other in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and creating resilient, sustainable and low carbon cities. C40 cities represent more than 650 million urban citizens and their economies account for 25% of global GDP. Our recent ‘Deadline 2020’ report sets out the critical role that the world’s major cities have to play in delivering the historic Paris Agreement to prevent catastrophic climate change.

C40’s growing team of 100+ staff is headquartered in London, with offices in New York, Rio de Janeiro, Copenhagen, Beijing and Paris, and individual staff based across 25+ different locations. C40 has an operating budget of c.$25m per year and is primarily funded through the generous support of philanthropic foundations. 

The strategic direction of the organization is determined by an elected Steering Committee of C40 mayors, which is chaired by the Mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo. Three-term Mayor of New York City Michael R. Bloomberg serves as President of the Board of Directors, which is responsible for operational oversight. A seven person management team, led by Executive Director, Mark Watts, leads the day-to-day management of C40.

Position Description

The C40 City Adviser will be the strategic focal point for long-term climate action planning in the City of Freetown that aligns with the ambitions of the Paris Climate Agreement, country commitments. This will involve engaging internal and external stakeholders, coordinating consultants to fill knowledge gaps, develop climate action pathways and prepare the city’s climate action plan, including governance frameworks, facilitating knowledge transfer across city departments and national Ministries, Departments and Agencies, and ensuring sustainability after the project duration. This includes setting / reviewing targets, identifying locally appropriate climate change response actions, and defining measurement, reporting and verification processes for mitigation and adaptation.

The C40 City Adviser’s relationship with the city government and other key stakeholders is critical for efficient and effective delivery. The City Adviser will be based at the Freetown City Council offices (Sierra Leone). 

The Freetown City Adviser will join a cohort of C40 City Advisers across cities in sub-Saharan Africa. A series of in-city and workshops will be held for all C40 cities in sub-Saharan Africa, complemented by regional workshops, to build capacity and enable peer interaction. 

As the ‘on the ground’ ambassador in the Freetown City Council, the City Adviser will also help to manage the partnership between the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group and the city government. This will include identifying and facilitating opportunities for collaboration, learning, innovation, action and advocacy, building local capacity, and building connections with other C40 cities and initiatives. 

The ideal candidate will have a strong technical background in carbon accounting (preferably using the Global Protocol for Community Scale Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventories – GPC), climate related risk and hazard assessments, climate action planning for mitigation and adaptation, scenario planning and stakeholder engagement; substantial experience working with cities on climate action planning, preferably within the African context; and excellent problem solving, project management and communication skills. 

Responsibilities: 

Working closely with the Freetown City Council, C40’s Measurement and Planning team and C40’s Regional Director for Africa, the City Adviser will develop and deliver a varied technical assistance programme to support the Freetown City Council in:

• Supporting and coordinating an inclusive internal and external stakeholder engagement in the CAP process through a variety of formats including, but not limited to workshops (for e.g. the prioritization of climate actions and launch of the CAP), focus group discussions, team meetings and individual consultations;
• Leverage existing stakeholder engagement formats and contribute to upcoming stakeholder engagements across the council’s work to incorporate the CAP process more widely;
• Facilitate better national and local integration of climate response activities to ensure that that Freetown’s CAP aligns with the City’s development agenda, Sierra Leone’s country plans commitments (with MTNDP, NDC, NAP and NAMA).
• Continue and complete Pathways emissions trajectory modelling – most likely through a series of focus group engagements across the energy, waste and transport sectors and individual stakeholder consultations where needed;
• Review the in 2018 developed city hazard and risk report, add / update evidence if needed and develop goals, targets and milestones for climate resilience and adaptation – most likely through an adaptation workshop;
• Gather, summarize and coordinate additional data points / evidence on cross-cutting themes, including but not limited to job creation, air and water quality, if needed to inform Freetown’s CAP; 
• Support and coordinate the development of implementable climate actions for adaptation and mitigation and their prioritization;
• Draw together existing knowledge to complete the Strategic CAP Appraisal that is underway, as a basis for Freetown’s CAP;
• Facilitate the completion of the GHG Inventory Management Plan;
• Support and coordinate the development of a climate finance framework accompanying Freetown’s CAP;
• Oversee, manage and review the work of consultants across all aforementioned points and coordinate technical assistance with the aim of building city capacity to implement climate action; 
• Ensuring delivery of the city’s climate action plan by working closely with city staff and contributing actively to the development of the plan;
• Manage and coordinate the partnership between the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group and the city government;
• Contribute to other work streams related to climate change of the Mayor’s Delivery Unit and the Freetown City Council; supervise staff and volunteers, if needed.

Person Specification:

• A relevant post-graduate degree;
• Five to ten years’ experience in government, business or NGO sectors with a focus on sustainability and/or climate change, and substantive experience working with or within municipal governments;
• Technical expertise in completing city-wide greenhouse gas emission inventories, undertaking scenario planning, and developing climate action plans;
• Technical expertise in assessing city-wide climate related risk and hazard, developing goals, targets and milestones for climate resilience and adaptation;
• Experience in working with climate change plans with or within municipal governments in Africa;
• Excellent project-management, strategic thinking and analytical capabilities, with MS Excel experience and data management skills;
• Demonstrable problem-solving, budget and people management experience, including working with third party delivery teams, and ability to manage multiple parallel tasks;
• Strong interpersonal, relationship building and written and verbal communication skills, combined with English fluency, knowledge of the local language Krio would be an advantage;
• Strong stakeholder engagement experience, as well as experience in developing or facilitating webinars, workshops, focus group discussions, etc.;
• International experience, working across different cultures, languages and time zones.

Other Requirements:

Applicants must already have the right to work in Freetown. Limited travel may be required as part of the role.