Today Ukraine is facing its most serious challenges since achieving independence in 1991. The ongoing war has already resulted in significant loss of life, unprecedented displacement, internally and towards neighboring countries, and devastating destruction of infrastructure. The UN Ukraine Flash Appeal shows that at least 15.7 million people are in immediate need of emergency assistance and protection. Early projections indicate that if the war should continue in the medium to long term, up to 90% of the Ukrainian population could face poverty and extreme economic vulnerability, and the country’s socio-economic progress could be set-back by almost 20 years. In the short-term, 62% of the population is at high risk of falling into poverty. Ukraine’s economy is set to shrink by 45% this year due to the war and even with a moderate recovery in the next few years, by 2025 the GDP would still only be two-thirds of the pre-war GDP in 2021.
In addition, the country faces losses of many people’s lives and devastative destruction of infrastructures and economic bases. Currently, more than 50% of the energy infrastructure damaged, causing the massive disruption of energy supply nationwide with millions of people experiencing power outages and challenges in heating. Extensive scale of destruction of infrastructure, rehabilitating or constructing infrastructures and installing equipment with necessary supply of the materials is urgently required to restore or maintain life-line and key basic services, followed by removal or mines and explosives as well as debris.
The widespread presence of landmines, cluster munitions, and other explosive remnants of war (ERW) in Ukraine pose a considerable and mounting threat. To address the emergency needs in the country, and meet long-term goals for Ukraine, UNDP is scaling-up Mine Action interventions through its a multi-donor funded Mine Action project which enhances the national capacity of Mine Action authorities and emergency service responders, establishes normative frameworks and links Mine Action with sustainable development outcomes.
The incumbent will prioritize gender equality and women’s empowerment within all implementations and promote UNDPs mandate as a gender-responsive organization with zero tolerance to any kind of discriminatory and abusive behaviour, including sexual harassment, sexual exploitation and abuse.

1. Ensure effective project communication: 

• In consultation with the Project Manager, develop a project communications strategy / plan (for internal and external communications, defining target audiences, purpose and objectives of communications, methods, timeframes, resources, and responsibilities), incorporate it with the annual work plans and update it annually in consultation with project stakeholders;
• Under the supervision of Project Manager, coordinate the implementation of the project communications strategy;
• Coordinate and oversee the implementation of public awareness activities across all project components;
• Under the supervision of operations, work with the project manager and programmatic team, UNDP CO communications, and global UNDP communications teams to support key partnerships with Government, пon-government and implementing partners to ensure effective communication and collaboration across a broad spectrum of stakeholders to maximize the impact of the project initiatives.

2 Facilitate knowledge building/ sharing:

•  Support and coordinate the development of knowledge management outputs of the project.
•  Ensure that the project is a leader in generating and providing knowledge management products on strengthening nationally owned mine action capacity through improved governance and coordination, integration of mine action with humanitarian and development plans, facilitation of access to safe and productive land to improved livelihoods and basic services, reduced risk of harm to affected populations, improved quality of life for EO victims, and measurable progress towards international treaty compliance.
•  Support in training relevant staff in communications and branding guidelines.
•  Facilitate the design and maintenance of the project website/webpages and ensure it is up-to-date and dynamic;
•  Facilitate learning and sharing of knowledge and experiences relevant to the project.

3. The incumbent of the position should avoid any kind of discriminatory behavior including gender discrimination and ensure that: 

• Human rights and gender equality is prioritized as an ethical principle within all actions;
• Activities are designed and implemented in accordance with “Social and Environmental Standards of UNDP”;
• Any kind of diversities based on ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, disability, religion, class, gender are respected within all implementations including data production;
• Differentiated needs of women and men are considered;
• Inclusive approach is reflected within all actions and implementations, in that sense an enabling and accessible setup in various senses such as disability gender language barrier is created;
• Necessary arrangements to provide gender parity within all committees, meetings, trainings etc. introduced.
• The incumbent performs other duties within their functional profile as deemed necessary for the efficient functioning of the Office and the Organization

4. Institutional Arrangement

Under the overall guidance and supervision of the Project Manager, the Communications Associate is fully responsible for ensuring smooth functioning and overall effectiveness of project communication strategy. In particular, the incumbent of the position will facilitate the creation of effective communications and dissemination of information on UNDPs Mine Action Project in Ukraine.

• Business Management: Digital Awareness and Literacy: Ability and inclination to rapidly adopt new technologies, either through skillfully grasping their usage or through understanding their impact and empowering others to use them as needed.
• Business Management: Customer Satisfaction/Client Management: Ability to respond timely and appropriately with a sense of urgency, provide consistent solutions, and deliver timely and quality results and/or solutions to fulfil and understand the real customers’ needs. Provide inputs to the development of
  customer service strategy. Look for ways to add value beyond clients’ immediate requests. Ability to anticipate client’s upcoming needs and concerns.
• Business Development: Knowledge Facilitation: Ability to animate individuals and communities of contributors to participate and share, particularly externally.
• Business Management: Partnerships Management: Ability to build and maintain partnerships with wide networks of stakeholders, Governments, civil society and private sector partners, experts, and others in line with UNDP strategy and policies.
• Business Management: Communication: 
  • Ability to communicate in a clear, concise and unambiguous manner both through written and verbal communication; to tailor messages and choose communication methods depending on the audience.
  • Ability to manage communications internally and externally, through media, social media and other appropriate channels.
• 2030 Agenda: Engagement & Effectiveness: Crisis and Fragility Policy and Engagement: Humanitarian-Development Peace (HDP) Nexus.
• 2030 Agenda: Peace: Governance: Inclusion and Participation.