CONSULTANT

Technical Consultant for the Integration and Scale-Up of Multiple Micronutrient Supplementation (MMS) within the National Nutrition Program

• Position: Technical Consultant (Senior Health Program Officer), Maternal Nutrition and MMS Scale-Up
• Company: Vitamin Angel Alliance, Inc. d/b/a Vitamin Angels (“Vitamin Angels” or “VA”)
• Contract Type: Independent Contractor
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  Location:
  Manila, Philippines, with regular engagement and collaboration with the Department of Health (DOH), including the Disease Prevention and Control Bureau (DPCB), and other relevant national and subnational stakeholders, as required.
• Contract Duration: The assignment is anticipated to extend for twelve (12) to twenty-four (24) months, subject to funding availability, program requirements and satisfactory performance.

About Vitamin Angels

Founded in 1994, Vitamin Angels is a public health nonprofit working to improve nutrition and health outcomes in low-resource settings worldwide. We strengthen, extend, and amplify the impact of our partner organizations working to reach the most nutritionally vulnerable groups – pregnant women, infants, and children – who are underserved by existing systems. We do this by delivering evidence-based interventions and offering technical assistance, including ongoing monitoring and evaluation, to ensure program quality, scale, and impact. Vitamin Angels works with over 2,000 local organizations, including governments, to reach more than 60 million women and children in 65 countries annually.

As part of its global technical assistance portfolio, Vitamin Angels collaborates with national governments and stakeholders to introduce or strengthen national health and nutrition Systems and expand access to proven maternal nutrition interventions, including Multiple Micronutrient Supplementation (MMS). VA envisions a world where every mother experiences a healthy pregnancy and every child have an equal opportunity for a healthy life. Unfortunately, more than three billion people globally, primarily those situated in low-resource settings, continue to face some form of malnutrition – especially micronutrient deficiencies and the adverse consequences that derive from micronutrient deficiency. Addressing this inequity requires expanding access to evidence-based nutrition interventions, particularly for underserved and nutritionally vulnerable populations.

Multiple micronutrient deficiencies during pregnancy are a major public health problem, especially for women in low
- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Micronutrient deficiency among pregnant women leads to poor maternal health and adverse pregnancy outcomes including low birth weight, pre-term birth, still birth, and poor child growth and development. Antenatal supplementation with iron and folic acid (IFAS) has been the global standard of antenatal care (ANC) for decades. However, in LMICs, there is a shift in antenatal supplementation to transition from IFAS to the United Nations International Multiple Micronutrient Antenatal Preparation (UNIMMAP) of a multiple micronutrient supplement (hereafter MMS means UNIMMAP MMS). MMS was developed by the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and the United Nations University in 1999 to contain iron, folic acid, and 13 other vitamins and minerals. MMS is more effective than IFAS in addressing micronutrient deficiency and its adverse consequences for the health of pregnant women and pregnancy outcomes. The WHO revised its guidelines for a positive pregnancy experience in 2020, and revised MMS use from “not recommended” to “recommended in the context of rigorous research”, including implementation research, and added MMS to the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines in 2025. Today, use of UNIMMAP MMS during pregnancy is one of the most important interventions to address micronutrient deficiency and its adverse consequences for the health of women and pregnancy outcomes.

Role or Purpose of Position

The Consultant will provide technical advisory, analytical, capacity-building, and knowledge management support to advance the integration and scale-up of MMS within maternal health and nutrition programs.

Services provided under this assignment shall support the shared public health objectives of Vitamin Angels and the Department of Health while remaining within the Consultant’s advisory and technical assistance role. The Consultant will support evidence-informed policy development, implementation planning, learning, and coordination efforts to strengthen maternal nutrition programs and expand access to MMS.

The Consultant shall serve solely in an advisory and technical assistance capacity and shall not exercise governmental, regulatory, supervisory, procurement or decision-making authority on behalf of the Department of Health.

Scope of