Consultancy: Consultant, Fiscal Space Analysis and WASH Finance Strategy Development to Support Resource Mobilization for Climate Resilient WASH in Madagascar - Req.#582195

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Consultancy Title: Consultant, Fiscal Space Analysis and WASH Finance Strategy Development to Support Resource Mobilization for Climate Resilient WASH in Madagascar - Req.#

Section/Division/Duty Station: Wash Section - Programme Division, NYHQ

Duration: July , 2025 to September 12, 2025

Home/ Office Based: NYHQ / Remote with trips to Madagascar 

About UNICEF 

If you are a committed, creative professional and are passionate about making a lasting difference for children, the world's leading children's rights organization would like to hear from you. For over 70 years, UNICEF has been working on the ground in 190 countries and territories to promote children's survival, protection and development. The world's largest provider of vaccines for developing countries, UNICEF supports child health and nutrition, good water and sanitation, quality basic education for all boys and girls, and the protection of children from violence, exploitation, and AIDS. UNICEF is funded entirely by the voluntary contributions of individuals, businesses, foundations and governments. UNICEF has over 12,000 staff in more than 145 countries.

BACKGROUND

Purpose of Activity/ Assignment:

Madagascar is the world’s fifth-largest island, situated in the Indian Ocean off the coast of southern Africa. The country is endowed with considerable natural resources and unparalleled biodiversity. However, its population, estimated at 30.3 million in 2023, faces the challenge of a persistently high poverty rate. Poverty is especially high in the south and the southeast, where it exceeds 91.2%, due to climate shocks (droughts, cyclones, and floods).

Madagascar faces significant challenges in accessing clean water. The government faces challenges with attracting financial resources required for implementation of the SDG 6. It is estimated that the country will require 11 times and 26 times faster progress to achieve 100% safely managed water and sanitation respectively by 2030. Poor WASH is a grave concern as it is directly linked to diarrhea and chronic malnutrition which affects children under 5 years (UNICEF Madagascar, 2018). According to government projections, investment to reach the SDG6 2030 targets in Madagascar requires around $ 2.6 billion. However, current allocations for WASH barely reach 0.01% of GDP, with the government unable to increase allocations due to limited domestic funding and the country's economic situation. 

To guide with planning, the WASH sector has finalized a National WASH policy that aims for universal access to water, sanitation, and hygiene by 2030, that is pending final government approval. Additionally, several analytical documents related to climate change have also been developed, which provide more visibility on climate risks and opportunities for climate financing in Madagascar, as well as the coherence between national climate strategies and WASH.

There is need to develop strategies to close the funding gap in the sector. Assessing the fiscal space to explore options to reduce the WASH financing gap is an important element of further policy planning and programme implementation in Madagascar. Additionally, the WASH sector can benefit from moving towards a strategic financing approach to achieve its targets to increase resource mobilization as well as define a strategy to leverage and blend the three sources of WASH sector financing: Taxes (government expenditure), Tariffs (public investment) and Transfers (ODA) as well as leverage on innovative financing mechanisms.

2.0       Purpose of the assignment

The ultimate goal of this assignment is to generate evidence to provide policy recommendations to support planning on financing for increased access to WASH in Madagascar.  Specifically, the purpose of this assignment is to: 

(i)         Assess the fiscal space of the government budget, leading to the formulation of policy measures to substantively improve efficiency in the use of public resources as well as