Enabel is the Belgian international cooperation agency. Our mission is to work towards a sustainable world where all live under the rule of law and are free to thrive. With its partners Enabel offers solutions addressing pressing global challenges – Climate Change, Urbanisation, Human Mobility, Peace and Security, Economic and Social Inequalities – and promoting Global Citizenship.

We have over 20 years' experience in areas ranging from education and health care to agriculture, environmental protection, digitalisation, employment and peace and security. The Belgian government, European Union institutions, governments of other countries and the private sector rely on our federal agency's global expertise. We work with civil society, research institutes as well as businesses and we foster fruitful interaction between development policy and other areas.  

With over 2100 staff, Enabel manages about 170 projects in more than twenty countries, in Belgium, Africa and the Middle East. 
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Background

The Belgium–Mozambique bilateral cooperation programme supports climate resilience and energy transition through results areas covering, among others, access to water and access to energy, delivered through public-sector capacity building, community engagement and private sector partnerships. Alongside it, complementary funding instruments – including a Brussels-Capital Region (BCR) top-up – reinforce specific activities. These instruments increasingly converge around an integrated approach to water and energy service delivery, on the premise that energy access can create the economic conditions (demand, density, private sector interest) that make rural water services more viable, and vice versa.

Mozambique's rural water and energy services face a shared structural challenge: isolated, single-sector infrastructure is difficult to sustain financially once donor funding ends, particularly in low-income rural areas where user tariffs alone rarely cover operating costs. At the same time, recurrent droughts, floods and cyclones make climate-resilient design a precondition for any lasting investment in either sector.

The objective is to strengthen the sustainability and scale-up potential of rural water and energy service delivery in Mozambique by testing and documenting integrated water-energy service models – including their financial viability, institutional anchoring, climate-adaptive design and private sector engagement – and by generating evidence capable of informing larger water and energy investment programmes under preparation or implementation, notably the GCF and EU Energy Programmes (~EUR 42M and ~EUR 20M respectively, both implemented by Enabel).

Job description

The Water-Energy Nexus Expert leads the technical preparation, implementation and supervision of rural water service delivery projects, whether integrated with energy or stand-alone. The core task is to ensure that proposed models are technically sound, financially viable, and anchored in institutional arrangements and financing – including climate finance – that can outlast donor funding.

The work covers feasibility studies and business model development, climate-adaptive infrastructure design, productive use of water and energy, PPP and delegated-management arrangements, supervision of works, contracts and grants, and the documentation of evidence to inform larger investment programmes. It also involves intersectoral coordination across water, energy, agriculture and related sectors, technical inputs to vocational training (TVET), and the mobilisation of climate and sector finance with government and technical and financial partners.

Where projects are integrated, a central principle is that water service delivery should be built into existing energy governance and operator structures rather than run in parallel.

The Expert reports to the Project Manager and works in close functional collaboration with the Rural Energy Access Expert. The role liaises with national and provincial water and energy sector counterparts, private operators and implementing partners, and contributes technical inputs to project formulation and revision processes across the portfolio.

Key responsibilities

Feasibility and project preparation

• Lead technical and financial scoping of feasibility and preparation studies: demand, technology options, climate-resilient design, tariffs and cost recovery, business models, productive use.
• Explore climate and carbon finance for long-term sustainability.

Service delivery and institutional anchoring

• Support service delivery models and their integration into existing operator, governance and contracting structures, including PPP, concession and delegated-management arrangements.
• Develop and stress-test tariff and cost-recovery models against demand, willingness to pay, productive-use income and OPEX risk.
• Formalise institutional arrangements with water and energy counterparts, and coordinate with agriculture and ecosystem authorities at provincial and district level.
• Ensure gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) considerations are built into service delivery models and governance arrangements.
• Supervise procurement and grant agreements with implementing partners, monitoring technical delivery, results and compliance. For WASH grants: operator performance, non-revenue water, cost recovery, water quality, tariffs, GESI, climate resilience.

Infrastructure delivery and skills

• Supervise operators and contractors on timely, compliant and climate-adaptive infrastructure delivery.
• Contribute technical content to TVET and operator training curricula.

Evidence, lessons learned and replication

• Document technical, financial, operational and institutional evidence from supervised projects.
• Contribute to replication tools and knowledge products feeding larger investment pipelines (GCF, EU Energy Programmes).
• Support mobilisation of climate and sector finance: turning evidence into fundable propositions and strengthening counterpart capacity to access it.

Your profile

Required qualifications

• Master's degree in Water or Sanitation Engineering, Environmental Engineering, Energy, Economics, Development Finance, or a related field.

Required experience 

• At least 7 years' professional experience in the water sector, including rural or peri-urban water supply, WASH, or water resource management.
• Feasibility studies and financial or tariff modelling, including assessment of technical, financial and institutional viability of service delivery models.
• Design or supervision of PPP, concession or delegated-management arrangements for water or energy services.
• Supervision of contracts, grants and technical delivery.
• Coordination across government institutions, regulators, operators, private sector and donors.

Required skills and knowledge

• Rural water service delivery models and WASH programmes.
• The water-energy nexus and energy-for-water applications.
• Financial and business modelling.
• Climate-resilient infrastructure.
• Application of GESI principles in service delivery.
• Fluency in English and Portuguese, spoken and written.

Applicants are also required to commit to the vision, mission and values of Enabel (https://www.enabel.be/content/enabel-vision-mission-values).

Assets

• Solar pumping, mini-grid-linked water systems, and productive use of water and energy.
• Climate, carbon or blended finance mechanisms.
• Familiarity with the Mozambican water and energy regulatory environment.
• Experience in low-capacity or resource-constrained operating environments.
• Contribution to technical or vocational training content for system operators.
• Experience working with multiple donor-funded programmes simultaneously.

We offer you

• A fascinating and impactful position in an international development environment. You are employed at Enabel in the function of “Water-Energy Nexus Expert”.
• An open-ended contract. You are based in Maputo.
• The position involves regular travel to project provinces and districts.
• A salary package that comprises the monthly gross salary, in accordance with our salary scales (Class 6).

Every person who fulfils the conditions listed in our job advertisements may apply. Enabel is committed to equal opportunities and diversity in its workforce. We do not discriminate on the basis of gender, origin, age, religion, sexual orientation, disability status or any other factor other than competence.

Are you interested?

Apply at the latest by 03/09/2026, here and include your application letter and updated CV.

Only applications submitted via here will be considered.