Jobs in Abuja at The International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC)
The International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC) is a public
international organization addressing critical issues such as
international food security, the alleviation of global hunger and
poverty, environmental protection and the promotion of economic
development and self-sufficiency.
IFDC focuses on increasing
productivity across the agricultural value chain in developing
countries. This is achieved by the creation and transfer of effective
and environmentally sound crop nutrient technology and agribusiness
expertise.
We are recruiting to fill the below position:
Job Title: Training Specialist
Location: Abuja
Job Description
- Realizing Sorghum and Millet Agricultural Productivity Gains in the Sahel/ Nigeria
Background
- The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) seeks to
establish a practical understanding of how the production of sorghum and
pearl millet features in Sahelian farming households’ overall
livelihoods, and what that means for the investment choices farmers make
regarding the production of these crops. Therefore BMGF awarded a grant
to Context Global Development (Context) to manage a pilot program in
Burkina Faso, Mali and Nigeria that tests different intervention
hypotheses through action-research with farming households.
- Context selected the International Fertilizer Development Center
(IFDC) as a sub-grantee to implement a two-year (2016-2017) pilot
project in Northern Nigeria. The purpose of the pilot project is to
strengthen the resilience of sorghum/ millet farming systems in
Northwestern Nigeria, by empowering smallholder farmers to develop
farming as a sustainable business. Building on the approach set by its
2SCALE program (www.2scale.org), IFDC will partner with a lead agrifood
company interested in sourcing high-quality sorghum and/or millet from
Nigerian smallholder farmers, and facilitate the development and
strengthening of business relationships among the value chain actors and
supporters.
- The objective is to deepen our understanding of how
partnerships, built with grassroots actors (farmers and their local
networks, called agribusiness clusters), and the companies and
entrepreneurs driving the value chain, achieve impact; and what the
business models are that support both competitiveness and inclusiveness.
This learning agenda will help identify incentives for smallholders to
invest (or not) in sorghum/ millet productivity, and possible scaling
pathways for the post-pilot phase.
- The project’s team in Nigeria will be composed of two full time
technical staff: a Team Leader and a Training Specialist. They will be
supported by part-time technical assistants and consultants, a
monitoring & evaluation (M&E) specialist and support staff
(administrative/ financial staff and drivers).
- This job description focuses on the Training Specialist position.
Duties
- The Training Specialist is responsible for designing the
project’s capacity building strategy, developing its capacity building
program and implementing it. S/he will be on the front line in training
and coaching sorghum/ millet agribusiness cluster actors in supplying
off-takers with commodities that are competitive and meet all quality
requirements. Specific duties include:
- Get acquainted with the capacity building initiatives of the
lead firm and other chain stakeholders to ensure alignment,
complementarities and synergies, and avoid duplication of efforts.
- Through a Diagnostic & Design workshop or any other approach
selected by the project, conduct a capacity building needs assessment
for smallholder farmers, their organizations and other (potential)
cluster actors (input dealers, traders, etc.).
- Building on identified gaps, design a capacity building strategy
for farmers and other cluster actors in view to developing competitive
agribusiness clusters and integrating them into selected value chain(s).
- Lead the integration of women in all capacity building
interventions, including through the development of specific capacity
building programs for women.
- Through training, action-research plots, demonstrations, field
coaching, exchange visits and other methods, elaborate a capacity
building program targeting cluster actors. Content-wise ensure quality,
relevance, and logical flow of information; to engage participants and
deliver content in an inspiring and useful manner, develop creative and
varied facilitation/ training methodologies, tapping into a range of
diverse facilitation tools. Capacity building topics will relate to crop
production (e.g. good agricultural practices; technical innovations;
sole, rotation and intercropping options), organizational development
(e.g. strengthening of farmer cooperatives; group leadership),
farming-as-a-business (e.g. costs of production; economics of the
sorghum/ millet-based farming systems; business planning; cropping plan)
and business relationships (within the cluster and with other chain
actors and supporters).
- To intensify and accelerate capacity building activities,
whenever needed identify and select local capacity building service
providers, contract them (e.g. professional service contracts, grants)
and monitor their performance.
- On a regular basis, fine-tune trainings and other capacity building programs, based on lessons learned, successes and failures.
- Provide agronomic advice and integrate them in the capacity
building programs, to increase the productivity of sorghum/ millet
farmers.
- Analyze and document the farming systems, with a specific focus
on how farmers make (or not) investments decisions and on incentives to
increase their productivity.
- Actively contribute to the pilot’s co-learning agenda from a capacity building and agronomic perspective.
- Write and submit quality progress and other technical reports or notes with a strict respect of deadlines, in good English.
- Document field achievements, innovations, failures and lessons
learned; integrate lessons learned into subsequent project activities.
- Develop synergies with other IFDC projects and with other programs in the country.
- The Training Specialist is also responsible for any other
assignment that IFDC’s management deems necessary for the success of the
project.
Position and Duty Station:
- The Training Specialist’s position is a national one with a duty
station in one of IFDC’s offices, either in a major city of Northwest
Nigeria or in Abuja.
- The position requires intensive travels (minimum 50% of the
time) in Northwest Nigeria, from time to time to other parts of the
country and exceptionally to other African countries like Ghana.
Supervision:
- The Training Specialist is supervised by and reports to the Team Leader of the project.
- S/he works in close collaboration with the 2SCALE team in Nigeria and West Africa.
Qualifications
- Minimum Bachelor’s degree in agronomy or agriculture-related field.
- At least 4 years of relevant experience in agriculture, with a
minimum of 2 years in training/ capacity building for farmers or other
grassroots actors.
- A professional experience in Northwestern Nigeria would be a strong advantage.
- Proven track record in capacity building program design in topics related to crop production and farming as a business.
- Excellent facilitation skills, familiarity with adult learning
approaches and methodologies, and competencies to use tailor-made and
diversified facilitation/ training methods and tools.
- Ability to communicate effectively and in a participatory way
with farmers and other stakeholders from both public and private
sectors, and ability to work in a multi-cultural and multi-disciplinary
environment.
- Ability to write quality documents in English.
- Fluent in Hausa and English.
Job Title: Team Leader
Location: Abuja
Job Description
- Realizing Sorghum and Millet Agricultural Productivity Gains in the Sahel/ Nigeria.
Background
- The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) seeks to
establish a practical understanding of how the production of sorghum and
pearl millet features in Sahelian farming households’ overall
livelihoods, and what that means for the investment choices farmers make
regarding the production of these crops. Therefore BMGF awarded a grant
to Context Global Development (Context) to manage a pilot program in
Burkina Faso, Mali and Nigeria that tests different intervention
hypotheses through action-research with farming households.
- Context selected the International Fertilizer Development Center
(IFDC) as a sub-grantee to implement a two-year (2016-2017) pilot
project in Northern Nigeria. The purpose of the pilot project is to
strengthen the resilience of sorghum/ millet farming systems in
Northwestern Nigeria, by empowering smallholder farmers to develop
farming as a sustainable business. Building on the approach set by its
2SCALE program (www.2scale.org), IFDC will partner with a lead agrifood
company interested in sourcing high-quality sorghum and/or millet from
Nigerian smallholder farmers, and facilitate the development and
strengthening of business relationships among the value chain actors and
supporters.
- The objective is to deepen our understanding of how
partnerships, built with grassroots actors (farmers and their local
networks, called agribusiness clusters), and the companies and
entrepreneurs driving the value chain, achieve impact; and what the
business models are that support both competitiveness and inclusiveness.
This learning agenda will help identify incentives for smallholders to
invest (or not) in sorghum/ millet productivity, and possible scaling
pathways for the post-pilot phase.
- The project’s team in Nigeria will be composed of two full time
technical staff: a Team Leader and a Training Specialist. They will be
supported by part-time technical assistants and consultants, a
monitoring & evaluation (M&E) specialist and support staff
(administrative/ financial staff and drivers).
- This job description focuses on the Team Leader position.
Duties
- The Team Leader is responsible for setting the strategy and
intervention model of the pilot project in Northern Nigeria, and for
managing project activities.
- S/he will be on the front line in leading the formation of
sorghum/ millet agribusiness clusters and inclusive value chains driven
by private off-taker partners.
Specific duties include:
- Develop a partnership agreement with the selected private
agri-food company driving the chain, clarifying (among others) the
shared ambition, objectives, strategy, key activities, roles and
responsibilities, governance structure and mechanisms, as well as risks
and mitigation measures.
- The agreement must add value to the societal commitments and
initiatives of the private lead firm, both in terms of activities and
measurement of impact at farm- and other levels in the value chain.
- Through multi-stakeholder activities, facilitate the development
of inclusive value chain(s) and business models, with a specific
attention to women stakeholders. Identify how to engage intermediaries
like aggregators in a sustainable way.
- Throughout the project lifetime, facilitate governance processes
at the partnership level and at the chain level, ensuring that
transparency and trust are built among parties.
- Lead the development of action plans with different parties, and
oversee and coordinate the implementation of field-level activities
agreed upon, including but not limited to technical and business
capacity building activities of grassroots actors; business planning;
facilitation of access to finance and of access to market information;
promotion of technical innovations (e.g. at farm-level) and
institutional innovations (e.g. to reduce transaction costs and improve
business ethics).
- Whenever needed, identify and select technical assistants and
consultants, contract them (e.g. professional service contracts, grants,
no-cost terms of reference - for 2SCALE staff) and monitor their
performance.
- Promote the integration of women throughout the project.
- In close collaboration with the M&E specialist and Context, develop and manage a M&E system.
- Promote the pilot’s co-learning agenda with all stakeholders and ensure its alignment with the learning approach set by Context.
- Write and submit quality progress and other technical reports or
notes with a strict respect of deadlines, in good (international-level)
English.
- Document field achievements, innovations, failures and lessons
learned; integrate lessons learned into subsequent project activities.
- Oversee financial aspects of the project, including but not
limited to the development and monitoring of budgets, financial
reporting, preparation of monthly fund requests, review of monthly
financial statements.
- Supervise other project staff and consultants.
- Ensure the integration of the pilot in the 2SCALE portfolio from
a technical/ methodological point of view, and develop synergies with
other IFDC projects and with other programs in the country.
- Develop and ensure good working relationships with key regional and national partner organizations, including local authorities.
- Represent the project at relevant national events.
- The Team Leader is also responsible for any other assignment
that IFDC’s management deems necessary for the success of the project.
Position and Duty Station:
- The Team Leader’s position is a national one with a duty station
in one of IFDC’s offices, either in a major city of Northwest Nigeria
or in Abuja.
- The position requires intensive travels (minimum 50% of the
time) in Northwest Nigeria, from time to time to other parts of the
country and exceptionally to other African countries like Ghana.
Supervision:
- The Team Leader is supervised by and reports to the Regional
Agribusiness Coordinator for 2SCALE in West Africa (based in Accra).
- S/he will works in very close collaboration with the 2SCALE
Cluster Advisor in Nigeria, and other cross-cutting thematic
specialists.
Qualifications
- Minimum Master's Degree in Agricultural Economics, Agronomy or Business Administration.
- At least 6 years of relevant experience in agribusiness, with a
minimum of 4 years in the private sector or with public-private
partnerships. A professional experience in Northwestern Nigeria would be
an advantage.
- Proven track record in leading a multi-disciplinary team and managing complex projects.
- Result-orientation and ability to take initiative, reach targets and respect deadlines.
- Rigorous work ethic and well organized.
- Ability to communicate effectively and in a participatory way
with stakeholders of diverse interests and at all levels (from farmers
to high-level officials), from both public and private sectors, and
ability to work in a multi-cultural and multi-disciplinary environment.
- Ability to write quality documents in English (international standards).
- Fluent in Hausa and English.
How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should send their applications in
English in the form of an email, indicating clearly the target position
in the subject line of the email, and including as separate attachments a
cover letter and a CV to:
[email protected] with copy to:
[email protected]
Note:
- Only pre-selected candidates will be contacted. They will be
invited for interviews and oral and written tests. The anticipated start
date of the assignment is January 18, 2016.
- Position open until filled.
Application Deadline 18th December, 2015.