The United Nations Office for
the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has established a Centre for
Humanitarian Data in The Hague, the Netherlands to help increase the use and
impact of data in the humanitarian sector. The vision is to create a future
where all people involved in a humanitarian emergency have access to the data
they need, when and how they need it, to make responsible and informed
decisions.
The Centre focuses on four areas: data services, data policy, data literacy,
and network engagement. The Centre’s data services work includes direct
management of the Humanitarian Data Exchange (HDX) platform and the
Humanitarian Exchange Language (HXL) data standard. The data literacy work
focuses on improving the data skills of technical and non-technical
humanitarians. For data policy, the Centre creates guidelines for the
responsible use of data by OCHA staff and partners. Finally, the Centre works
to further build and engage an active community in support of its mission and
objectives through a number events and communication activities.
The Centre’s
Data Fellows programme began in 2018 and aims to expose the Centre and its
partners to new areas of data-related expertise that can impact humanitarian
response. The structure of the programme provides Fellows with exposure to
different parts of the humanitarian system while allowing them to focus time
and energy on an individual project that addresses a challenge related to the
use and impact of data in the sector.
The Centre will host its
second class of Data Fellows in The Hague in June and July 2019. The 2019
Fellows will focus on four areas where the Centre is seeking new perspectives,
insights and partnerships including: Business Strategy, Data Science (education
data), Predictive Analytics, and Statistics (disability data). The Fellowship
programme is residential, with Fellows living and working in The Hague under
the direction of the Coordinator for the Data Fellows Programme.
Disability Data in Humanitarian Action
Globally, an estimated one billion people have a disability, of
which 800 million live in developing countries. In any crisis-affected community, persons
with disabilities continue to be among the most marginalized: an estimated 9.7
million are forcibly displaced because of persecution, conflict and human
rights violations. In some cases, morbidity in disasters has been estimated at
a rate four times higher than that of persons without disabilities, as are
instances of sexual violence and abuse.
Data that accurately
describes the demographics of persons with disabilities is currently very
scarce, especially in humanitarian contexts. To ensure inclusion and the safety
of persons with disabilities in humanitarian emergencies it is however
essential to be able to reflect the prevalence and nature of disabilities
amongst the affected population to appropriately plan and implement a response.
Existing tools for needs
assessment, planning, monitoring and evaluation in humanitarian action are
neither adapted to data collection about persons with disabilities nor
sufficiently joined-up to address disability as a cross-cutting issue.
Disaggregation of disability data in humanitarian action also require greater
standardization of data collection approaches to allow comparability and
meaningful data exchange. Only 6% of the indicators in the Inter-Agency
Standing Committee register are possible to disaggregate by disability.
At the Global Disability
Summit in 2018, OCHA signed the Charter for Change with specific commitments
to achieve the rights of people with disabilities in developing countries.
These commitments included, among others, to support the finalization of
inter-agency guidelines and after their launch, to advocate for their use and
coordinate their implementation. OCHA also committed to establishing a
fellowship to improve standard frameworks for disability data collection and
analysis.
We are looking for a
candidate who is self-motivated and can thrive in an international,
multidisciplinary team. The right candidate has the skills and abilities that
together comprise the necessary levels of statistical expertise to develop
methodologies and analytical frameworks to turn data into action and to think
strategically about how to use data to create value for humanitarian response.
Reporting
Relationships
The Consultant on Statistics will report to the Coordinator for the Data
Fellows Programme under the overall direction of the Lead for the Centre for
Humanitarian Data. She or he will be expected to work closely with the rest of
the Centre team.