UNDP is the UN global development network, advocating for change and connecting countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life. It works with individual countries on their own solutions to global and national development challenges. UNDP Lesotho supports Lesotho’s development priorities laid out in the National Strategic Development Plan. The focus areas include: democratic Governance; Environment and Energy; Poverty Reduction and economic Growth, with Gender Mainstreaming and HIV/AIDS as cross cutting areas.

The Government of Lesotho launched a Lesotho Data for Sustainable Development with support from EU and UNDP. This project is aimed at assisting the Government in the collection, analysis and dissemination of development data and building institutional and technical capacities for monitoring and evaluation of development programs and effective public management systems. The data project is being implemented by the Ministry of Development Planning, through the Department of Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) and Bureau of Statistics (BOS). The project has three inter-linked components, namely, i) definition of systematic tools for measuring development programs; ii) promotion of literacy and innovation for data collection, dissemination and use; and iii) strengthening national leadership, institutional and technical capacities for effective coordination and sectoral engagement.

The project is currently implementing a capacity building response following a preliminary phase where necessary evidence was gathered through a rigorous stakeholders-engagement. The consultative process involved a National Level Diagnosis Workshop, Cluster Level Data Gap Analysis, User Assessment and interviews at institutional level.  Importantly, this exercise was pivotal in establishing some data gaps and institutional challenges related to performing statistical and M&E functions across the entire National Statistical System (NSS) and National Monitoring and Evaluation System (NMES). Major gaps were identified in the Environmental Statistics. The last report published on environmental statistics was published in March 2018, and the available data is considered inadequate to report on related SDGs indicators as well as national frameworks. Environmental statistics is a relatively new area for the Bureau of Statistics; as such the Bureau has been unable to adequately produce timely, robust, credible and relevant statistics that are compliant with fundamental principles of official statistics in this area.  There is also limited expertise in environment statistics as the team does not possess any technical expertise to competently lead and support production of this type of statistics. The focus areas that need urgent attention are data collection and analysis for Biodiversity, Air and climate change and Solid Waste statistics.

It is against this background that on behalf of the Ministry of Development Planning, UNDP is seeking a reputable environment statistics specialist to provide technical support to the Environment and Energy Statistics (EES) Division of the BOS in producing Environment Statistics and to enhance the knowledge of the personnel undertaking collection of this statistics in Lesotho. The expert will be expected to design the Lesotho Strategy for Production of Environment Statistics, review survey instruments and data collection mechanisms, and review data processing and analysis as well as advice on the required staff complement and competencies.