Mekelle University Jobs Vacancies 2018 for Agricultural development, Project management – Jobs in Ethiopia
Mekelle University Jobs Vacancy, Mekelle University Recruitment, Mekelle University Jobs Opportunities… Jobs details below…
Mekelle Jobs Vacancies 2018
Rural Development expert (social inclusion and capacity building) for REALISE
The Bilateral Ethiopia – Netherlands Effort for Food, Income and Trade (BENEFIT)
Job description
Category: Agricultural development, Project management
Location: Mekelle, Woldia, Bahir Dar and Haramaya
Career Level: Mid-career Level (5+ years’ experience)
Employment Type: Full time
Salary: Based on the Scale of BENEFIT experts.
Background
The Bilateral Ethiopia Netherlands Effort for Food Income and Trade (BENEFIT) partnership is a portfolio of five
programmes (ISSD Ethiopia, CASCAPE, ENTAG, SBN and REALISE), which is funded by the Government of the
Kingdom of Netherlands through its Embassy in Addis Ababa. REALISE: ‘Realising Sustainable Agricultural
Livelihood Security in Ethiopia’ is the new programme under BENEFIT. REALISE Programme is designed to
take the achievements of CASCAPE (Capacity building for Scaling up of evidence-based best Practices in
Agricultural Production’ (CASCAPE) programme and the ‘Integrated Seed Sector Development’ (ISSD) Ethiopia
programme to new areas and target groups in Ethiopia.
REALISE is a three – year (2018-2022) programme that will align with the Government of Ethiopia’s (GoE)
Productive Safety Net Programme (PSNP). This GoE flagship programme currently reaches 8 million chronically
food insecure Ethiopians with a wide array of instruments to smooth consumption, prevent asset depletion and
promote livelihood diver
As the REALISE programme is part of the BENEFIT portfolio of programmes, close collaboration with the sister
programmes and their activities in the respective clusters is expected.
Rural development expert- social inclusion and capacity building expert
The social inclusion and capacity building expert/ rural development expert (RDE) will work with other RDE team
members. The expert is based in the University cluster and is supervised by the Cluster Manager. The team of
the RDEs (agricultural economics expert, seed expert, scaling expert, social inclusion and capacity building
expert, and agronomist) will be the front-line representatives of REALISE in the woredas. They will introduce
REALISE promoted technologies and approaches that are aimed at increasing food security of small holder
farmers – and more specifically PSNP clients. To this end, they will work closely as a team of experts together
with their Cluster Manager and the colleagues in the other clusters. The RDEs will work closely with his/her
colleagues from the CASCAPE and ISSD programmes. The social inclusion and capacity building expert is
responsible for the inclusion of women, men and youth in the REALISE interventions and capacity building
activities.
Depending on the different skills and specific experiences, he/she may get additional assignments for:
Data management
Documentation
Climate change related issues
Any other theme that may be pertinent
Key responsibilities
1. Participate in the implementation of the annual planning cycle: prepare succinct annual work plans
and budgets, progress reports and annual reports;
2. Ensure a truly bottom up planning process and ensure continuous community participation in the work
at hand;
3. Work with woreda staff and or NGOs and community organisations on:
a. Recommendation mapping;
b. Training needs assessments;
c. Training (of trainers) in various skills related to community development, seed, agriculture
(best fit practices);
d. Innovative pilot activities;
e. Institutionalization and scaling of best fit practices preferred by PSNP beneficiaries
4. Responsible for ensuring that men, women and youth participate in and benefit from project activities;
5. Maintain close and collaborative relations with key programme partners, including (but not limited to)
the woreda level PSNP staff, the Bureau of Agriculture and Livestock Resources staff, the agricultural
research partners (RARI’s and if applicable EIAR) and the collaborating NGOs;
6. Strategically position the project in the playing field in the area covered by the cluster, make sure the
strategic choices of the programme are aligned with those of the partners. Make sure the
programme’s results are used to accelerate discussions on pertinent policy issues in the region.
Actively participate in a wide range of fora pertinent to the programme;
7. Actively participate in the REALISE programme endeavours and the BENEFIT portfolio, interact with
the other CASCAPE and ISSD teams at cluster levels and contribute to joint activities;
8. Within reasonable limits, respond to pertinent technical assistance requests from other BENEFIT
projects (most likely CASCAPE and ISSD);
9. Any other assignments given by the REALISE Cluster manager; and
10. Serve as an ambassador of the REALISE programme in the area covered by the cluster.
Professional requirements:
1. A M.Sc. in rural sociology, rural development with agriculture component, rural development and
agricultural extension; family science
2. At least 5+ years of professional experience in positions pertinent to the assignment;
3. Experience with research and development issues;
4. Experience in working with or within the GoE structure for agriculture, especially at woreda level;
5. Experience with bottom-up planning processes;
6. Proven experience with gender mainstreaming (not necessarily as gender expert but working in
projects that mainstream gender);
7. Experience with participatory approaches and stakeholder networks;
8. Experience in the management of partnerships with a wide array of partners, including government at
the woreda level, NGOs and local community organisations.
Additional skills and qualities:
1. Excellent team player, able to bring out the best in the team members as well as collaborating with
the sister programmes within the BENEFIT portfolio. Able to inspire colleagues;
2. Excellent connector to the world around REALISE, creating a strong institutional and personal
professional network that will contribute to the success of REALISE;
3. Adhering to the highest standards of integrity, honesty and loyalty, and demanding the same
standards from the REALISE team;
4. Affinity with and dedication to the goals of the REALISE programme: providing support to the poorest
in rural Ethiopia through the introduction of more productive agriculture practices and seed;
5. Understanding and commitment to the REALISE project vision of achieving a vibrant, commercial, and
pluralistic seed sector. Knowledge of seed and the Ethiopian seed sector is an advantage;
6. Able to work independently while still maintaining good contact with the REALISE cluster manager;
7. Able to express him/herself in English in speaking and writing;
8. Ability of local languages: Tigrigna for those who want to apply for Mekelle University position and
Oromo Language for those who want to apply for Haramaya University position is a mandatory.
9. Up to date computer skills; and
10. Proven ability to work in multidisciplinary research teams.
Additional tasks and requirements for the social inclusion and capacity building rural development
expert are:
Ensure gender, nutrition and climate change concerns are considered while validating best practices;
Ensure gender mainstreaming;
Ensure that nutrition-sensitive approaches are used;
Coordinate capacity development activities on the subject of gender and livelihoods with partner
projects such as CASCAPE, ISSD, SBN etc.;
Support other experts in mainstreaming gender in their daily work.
Specific professional requirements:
At least 5 years of experience in applied rural development research and development;
Knowledge of statistical software such as SPSS, and/or other packages;
Knowledge of inclusion of women, men and youth inclusion in beneficiaries of the programmes;
Knowledge of participatory approaches to research.
Other:
Number of experts: four (4), one each for the four Universities (Mekelle, Woldia, Bahir Dar and Haramaya)
Duty station: Respective University
Travel: Able to travel frequently to the project partners in the area covered by the cluster. Travel may include
visits to the field under challenging circumstances.
Oversight: Not applicable.
Remuneration: Commensurate with the responsibilities based on the salary scale of BENEFIT. Benefits
include participation in the pension scheme and communication allowance. The salary will be adjusted on an
annual basis to the cost of living in Ethiopia.
The position of social inclusion and capacity building expert of the REALISE programme requires a full-time
commitment of the successful candidate. No additional professional engagements will be allowed.
Application procedures: Interested candidates are invited to send a well-formulated letter of motivation of no
more than one page and their up-to-date CV by within eight days from the date that the application is first
posted on the web site by email:
For Mekelle University REALISE send to <[email protected]>/ <[email protected]> with copy to
<[email protected]>;
For Woldia University REALISE send to <[email protected]> with copy to
<[email protected]>;
For Bahir Dar University REALISE send to <[email protected]> with copy to
<[email protected]>;
For Haramaya University REALISE send to <[email protected]> with copy to
<[email protected]>
Please do not attach your credentials to the application, which is required to be delivered in hardcopy only at
the time of interview.
Note Only short-listed candidates will be contacted for face-to-face interview. Short listed candidates are required
to submit true copies of their academic credentials.
