Senior Technical Officer -Environmental and Wastewater Surveillance (AfCDC)

Organization Information

Job Title: Senior Technical Officer -Environmental and Wastewater Surveillance
Job Grade: P3
Number of Direct Reports: 0
Number of Indirect Reports: 0
Contract Type: Appointment for Limited Duration (ALD)
Reports to: Head of Division, Surveillance and Disease Intelligence

Purpose of Job

Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) is a specialized technical institution of the African Union (AU) established to support public health initiatives of Africa Union Member States (AU MS) and strengthen the capacity of their public health institutions to detect, prevent, control, and respond quickly and effectively to disease threats. Africa CDC supports AU MS in providing coordinated and integrated solutions to the inadequacies in their public health infrastructure, human resource capacity, disease surveillance, laboratory diagnostics, and preparedness and response to health emergencies and disasters.

Main Functions

The Senior Technical Officer Environmental and Wastewater Surveillance shall:

• Lead and coordinate Africa CDC’s environmental surveillance efforts, with a primary focus on wastewater-based epidemiology. The officer will work closely with Member States, regional partners, and technical institutions to strengthen wastewater and environmental surveillance systems and integrate them into national and continental public health surveillance frameworks.
• Engage with technical and funding partners to ensure alignment with continental priorities, advocate for funding for Africa CDC and Member States and oversee the successful implementation of environmental surveillance activities across Africa.

Specific Responsibilities

The Senior Technical Officer – Environmental and Wastewater Surveillance will:

• Be responsible for the development and implementation of the continental strategic frameworks, policy and technical guidance for environmental and wastewater surveillance in Africa.
• Provide technical assistance to AU Member States in establishing and strengthening wastewater and environmental surveillance systems for monitoring public health threats and risks
• Lead the design and execution of multi-country environmental and wastewater surveillance initiatives to inform public health decision-making.
• Support the integration of environmental and wastewater surveillance data into existing disease surveillance platforms at national and continental levels.
• Collaborate with key stakeholders including AU Member States, Regional Economic Communities, National Public Health Institutes (NPHIs), Laboratories, Academia and others, to build technical capacity in environmental surveillance.
• Facilitate development and delivery of training programs, workshops, and knowledge-sharing forums on wastewater-based epidemiology and environmental surveillance approaches.
• Engage with other AU agencies, continental and international partners, donors, and research institutions to mobilize resources and align Africa CDC’s efforts with global and continental best practices.
• Conduct monitoring and evaluation (M&E) activities to assess the impact of environmental and wastewater surveillance programs and recommend improvements.
• Prepare high-quality reports, policy briefs, and technical documents on environmental surveillance.
• Represent Africa CDC in technical working groups, regional meetings, and global forums on wastewater surveillance.
• Perform any other duties as assigned by the supervisor

Academic Requirements and Relevant Experience

A master’s degree in environmental health, Medical Microbiology, or a related field with, or a related field with 7 years of experience out of which three (3) years should be at the supervisory level.

OR

Bachelor’s degree in environmental health, Medical Microbiology, or a related field with 10 years of relevant experience and 3 years at supervisory level

•    Experience working with African public health institutions, preferably with a regional or continental reach. Demonstrated experience in designing and implementing public health surveillance programs. Proven track record in capacity building, training, and stakeholder engagement.

Required Skills

Functional Skills 

• Demonstrable experience in implementing public health programs with a focus on wastewater surveillance.
• Excellent leadership skills including the capacity to organise people to achieve a shared goal and inspire staff.
• Experience in managing multi-stakeholder, multi-country programs.
• Excellent diplomatic, representational, interpersonal and communication skills, including experience with successfully interacting with stakeholders and decisionmakers in technical and other professional settings.
• Demonstrated project planning and management skills for organizing, planning and executing projects from conception through implementation.
• Skills in translating highly technical information into presentations, briefings and, report and funding proposals for both technical and lay audiences.
• Excellent computer skills, including word-processing capabilities, proficiency with e-mail and internet applications, power-point and experience in using statistical, database, and analytic tools like R, ArcGIS, MS Word and Excel etc is desirable.

Personal Abilities

• Ability to deliver under tight deadlines and work well under pressure.
• Analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Good interpersonal skills.
• Ability to operate in a multicultural environment.
• High level of autonomy at work, yet with profound team spirit.
• Adaptive, patient, resilient and flexible.
• Proactive and solution oriented.

TENURE OF APPOINTMENT:

The Appointment will be for a period of Eleven (11) Months, of which the first three (3) months will be considered as a probationary period. Thereafter, the contract may be renewed subject to funding availability, satisfactory performance and agreed deliverables

GENDER MAINSTREAMING:

Africa CDC is an equal opportunity employer and qualified women are strongly encouraged to apply.

LANGUAGES:

• Proficiency in one of the AU working languages (Arabic, English, French, Kiswahili, Portuguese, and Spanish) is mandatory and fluency in another AU language is an added advantage

REMUNERATION:

The salary attached to the position for the eleven month period is US$  88,844.56  (P3 Step 5) inclusive of all allowances for internationally recruited staff, and US$ 68,255.99 inclusive of all allowances for locally recruited staff of the African Union.

 

APPLICATION INFORMATION

Applications must be submitted no later than February 24 ,2026 11h59 p.m. EAT.

-Only candidates who meet all job requirements and are selected for interviews will be contacted.

-Consideration will be given only to those candidates who have submitted a fully completed online application with a curriculum vitae (CV), an African passport, and the required academic qualifications, such as Diplomas, Bachelor’s degrees, Master’s degrees and any relevant certificate in line with the area of expertise.

-The African Union is an equal opportunity employer, and female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

-Candidates from less represented countries within the African Union are strongly encouraged to apply for positions that fit their profiles.

These countries include: Algeria, Angola, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Comoros, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Eswatini, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Mali, Morocco, Namibia, Niger, Sahrawi D.R., Sao Tome and Principe., Seychelles, Somalia and Tunisia.