Ireland: Agriculture Adviser

Agriculture Adviser

Working with the world’s poorest people to transform their lives. Concern Worldwide is an international humanitarian organisation dedicated to tackling poverty and suffering in the world’s poorest countries. We work in partnership with the very poorest people in these countries, directly enabling them to improve their lives, as well as using our knowledge and experience to influence decisions made at a local, national and international level that can significantly reduce extreme poverty.

Job Title:

Agriculture Adviser

Reports to:

Senior Food and Nutrition Adviser/ Food Security and Livelihoods team lead

Liaises with:

Other units in the Strategy, Advocacy and Learning department, Country Offices, International Programmes Department and the Emergency Unit.

Job Location:

Dublin with substantial overseas travel

Contract Details:

Permanent position

Pay Band:

5: €41,747 – €49,114

Job Purpose:

To promote food security, livelihoods and the elimination of extreme poverty in the poorest countries through the provision of technical and strategic support to country programmes and the sharing of evidence and learning within Concern and beyond.

The role will focus on crop, livestock and vegetable production, agricultural value chains and natural resource management with a strong focus on the humid and sub humid tropics, highlands and coastal areas, as well as more occasional support to country programmes in the Sahel and Horn of Africa.

Main duties &Responsibilities:

· Provide the technical lead for Concern’s work on climate change and agriculture, nutrition sensitive agriculture, agriculture and social protection and linkages between small holder agricultural production and the private sector.

· Provide technical and strategic support on agriculture to country teams to ensure increasingly integrated programmes are designed, implemented, monitored and evaluated correctly. This will include ensuring Concern’s programmes adhere to the highest possible quality standards.

· Undertake a series of technical field support visits and provide remote support to country teams. This will include working with country teams in finding innovative ways of addressing climate change, resilience in disaster prone fragile countries and rural poverty in their agriculture programmes.

· Build the technical capacity of Concern country teams through formal training, webinars, and remote mentoring.

· Synthesise, document and share practical evidence and learning from Concern’s programmes. This will demonstrate our thought leadership in finding innovative solutions in the challenging contexts in which we work.

· Support country teams in the integration of issues of inequality and risk and vulnerability (in line with Concerns’ Understanding of Extreme Poverty) in their agriculture interventions.

· Keep abreast of current developments in research and provide guidance on how this can be applied in Concern’s programmes.

· Support operational research undertaken within Concern programmes and develop relationships with other agencies, including research institutions and universities (including the CGIAR centres, such as ICRAF), technical working groups and represent Concern in national, regional and international fora as relevant.

· Support the development of programme proposals, provide input to annual reports and meta-reviews, support the recruitment of country programme staff, and engage in multi-sectoral/ inter-departmental initiatives such as staff induction.

· Support Fundraising and the New Business Unit to develop relationships with donors and support the development of new proposals.

· Support the Advocacy unit to feed into international policy discussions related to climate smart agriculture and nutrition sensitive agriculture.

· Potentially be deployed to support emergency responses for up to six weeks.

Person specification:

Essential:

· A postgraduate degree in agriculture, crop science, animal production, veterinary medicine, soil science, natural resource management, environmental science or related field.

· A minimum of five years’ experience working in the area of agriculture in an NGO or development agency, three of which should have been based in a developing country in Sub Saharan Africa or Asia.

· Experience in planning, implementation and evaluation of agriculture programmes in various contexts.

· Strong understanding of the multiple causes of food insecurity and the role of the agriculture sector within. Good understanding of integrated programmes especially the linkages to markets, social protection, health and nutrition.

· Experience in using participatory methodologies in agriculture.

· A strong understanding of inequality issues in relation to food security and livelihoods programmes.

· Excellent interpersonal and organisational skills; works well as part of a multi-disciplinary team. Adaptable to evolving work priorities and schedules.

· Willing to travel overseas for up to 30% of working time.

· Ability to communicate and write well in English, distilling potentially complex information into accessible guidance for different audiences. Ability to engage with researchers to steer research towards relevant and practical outputs.

· Keen to learn and promote learning. Experience of designing training courses and materials.

Desirable

· Experience working in integrated, multi-sectoral programmes including social protection, livelihoods, nutrition, health, and WASH. Familiarity with social and behaviour change approaches.

· Experience of watershed management and coastal development approaches.

· Experience of crop and food processing and value chain analysis.

· Support for policy development and advocacy, with a good understanding of the political economy of agricultural policy decisions.

· Experience of Urban Agriculture.

· Experience working with research institutions, and relevant national and international institutions and networks.

· Basic knowledge on new emerging approaches and technologies such as GIS and Climate Modelling.

· Ability to work in French.

Concern has a Programme Participant Protection Policy and an organisational Code of Conduct which have been developed to ensure the maximum protection of programme participants from exploitation, and to clarify the responsibilities of Concern staff, consultants, visitors to the programme and partner organisation, and the standards of behaviour expected of them. In this context, staff have a responsibility to the organisation to strive for, and maintain, the highest standards in the day-to-day conduct in their workplace in accordance with Concern’s core values and mission. Any candidate offered a job with Concern Worldwide will be expected to sign the Programme Participant Protection Policy and the Concern Staff Code of Conduct as an appendix to their contract of employment. By signing the Programme Participant Protection Policy and the Concern Code of Conduct, candidates acknowledge that they have understood the contents of both the Concern Code of Conduct and the Programme Participant Protection Policy and agree to conduct themselves in accordance with the provisions of these two documents.

Concern receives a substantial amount of funding from external donors each year. Increasingly donors are introducing requirements whereby future funding is conditional on Concern ensuring that the names of any new employee or volunteer do not appear on terrorism lists generated by the European Union (List of person, groups and entities to which Regulation (EC No. 2580/2001 applies), the US Government (Office of Foreign Assets Control list of specially designated Nationals and Blocked Persons) and the United Nations (Consolidated List).

Any offer of employment (either paid or voluntary) with Concern Worldwide will only be made following a successful clearance check being conducted on the applicant. For additional information please consult our web site or contact the Human Resource Division in our Head Office.

By submitting a formal application for paid or voluntary employment to Concern, you agree to Concern carrying out a clearance check as outlined above and that Concern will not proceed to recruit you should your name appear on any of the aforementioned lists.

To view and apply for this vacancy, please go to http://www.concern.net/jobs by 13th April 2017.

Candidates must be legally entitled to work in Ireland at the time of application.

Concern is an equal opportunity employer and welcomes applications from all sections of the community.