Agricultural Development - Young Professionals Internship Program

Africa Lead II

Agricultural Development

Young Professionals Internship Program

Call for Applications

Opening Date: March 10, 2016

Closing Date: March 18, 2016

Africa Lead II—the Feed the Future: Building Capacity for African Agricultural Transformation Program—supports the advancement of agricultural transformation in Africa as proposed by the African Union Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Program (CAADP). Simultaneously, Africa Lead II contributes to the Feed the Future (FTF) goals of reduced hunger and poverty by building the capacity of Champions—defined as men and women leaders in agriculture—to develop, lead, and manage the policies, structures and processes needed for the transformation process.

The scope of Africa Lead II is divided into three components, as follows:

• Component One: Establishing and Improving Effectiveness of Institutional and Organizational Architecture for African-Led Agricultural Transformation.
• Component Two: Strengthening Capacity to Manage and Implement the Policy Change and Alignment Process.
• Component Three: Promoting the Effective Participation of Non-State Actors (NSAs) in the Policy Process and Providing Capacity Strengthening Support when Necessary.

Africa Lead II’s Agriculture Internship Program aims to facilitate more efficient agricultural production, stronger agribusinesses and agricultural development institutions, a more direct link between NARS and farmers, and greater value addition in the agriculture sector across Africa. The broad goal is to support skills transfer and technological know-how that will help African agribusinesses and organizations to innovate, improve their commercial viability and catalyze agricultural transformation, thus contributing to improved food security.

The Africa Lead II Program welcomes applications from candidates interested in pursuing these young professionals development opportunities. Placement terms will be for a period of 12 months with anticipated postings in ECOWAS member states :Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo and Cape Verde.

Housing, monthly stipend, living allowances, round-trip airfare and related travel expenses to worksite will be covered by the program. These 12 month young professionals development opportunities are not guarantees for full time employment upon successful completion of the placement. Preference will be given to ECOWAS Nationals.

The following positions are open for applications to support the advancement of African Agricultural Development Regional hosting entities:

· Entry to Mid -Level Communications Associates

· Entry to Mid -Level Program Planning Associate

· Entry to Mid -Level Monitoring & Evaluation Associate

Nationals of ECOWAS countries welcome to apply. Please send applications to: AfricaLEAD_Internships@dai.comby March 18, 2016 5:00PM GMT

General Minimum Required Qualifications

Bachelor’s degree Minimum , plus 2 years of relevant administrative or technical professional experience; or a Master’s degree preferred with 1 year of relevant administrative or technical professional experience

• Strong organizational skills and attention to detail
• BS/BA degree required, advance degree preferred
• Excellent oral and written communication skills
• Must be able to travel and be based within Regional Institution in West Africa during the entire duration of the placement (minimum 1 year assignment)

General Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in West African regional agricultural development A plus
• International Travel and field related experience in urban and rural African settings desirable
• Fluency in both French and English required

General Application requirements

All candidates must submit the following required documents:

· Curriculum Vitae

· 1-Page Cover letter highlighting your ability to contribute your skills towards enhancing capacity of a regional organization involved in Food security. Kindly specify your strengths and weaknesses and ability to adapt to new mutli-cultural environment.

· 3 References: kindly provide 2 professional references and 1 personal reference

Entry to Mid-Level Communications Associate

Responsibilities

· Design and create communications materials highlighting institutional programs and achievements (flyers, handouts, posters, etc.)

· Support drafting, editing, publication and dissemination of reports and scientific journals and marketing materials such as success stories, presentations, and two-page briefs, in collaboration with office and technical staff;

· Review and analyze data for reports and document progress for success stories as well as monthly, quarterly and annual reports

· Assist with development and implementation of Communication Plan including overseeing development of communication materials and tools and dissemination to all stakeholders.

· Support design, development, and manage content of organization’s website and related electronic communications;

· Website development and maintenance

· Contribute to improving the organizations global communications strategy to reflect evolving communications priorities and changes in the organization’s structure

· Present progress toward achievement of overall program objectives and outputs effectively and efficiently;

· Support department in the compilation and editing of weekly, quarterly and annual reports on the organization’s progress

· Support the organization of events such as press conferences, meetings and forums as requested;

· Collaborate with other public relations, media, and advertising firms as required, including interface with local, regional, and national media outlets;

· Review organization’s external communications and technical reports to ensure quality control and consistency with project intellectual property agreements;

· Provide guidance and leadership for communication and information sharing between regional partners

· Perform other tasks as needed

Required skills

· Bachelor’s degree in communication, marketing, social science, or related field

· Technical experience in communications and marketing Strong writing and communication abilities

· Fluency in French is required and proficiency in English highly desirable

Entry to Mid-Level Program Planning Associate

Responsibilities

· Serve as a primary liaison for general administration and back-stopping for department program portfolio.

· Help develop scopes of work and budgets and participates in meetings and conference calls with partners and stakeholder.

· Assist with the development and dissemination of request for proposals for service providers to provide capacity development services.

· Communicate and coordinate with department staff their service requirement needs.

· Assist with the development of the projects scopes of works, identifies service providers, and coordinates with the technical and logistics teams regarding the execution, implementation and monitoring of activities.

· Review reports and deliverables received from service providers and partners, including training organizations, trainers and consultants.

· Help coordinate the implementation and delivery of capacity development services on and off –site with respective partners.

· Contribute to writing and preparation of Quarterly and Annual reports.

· Provide regular updates and reports on status and progress of technical activities to directors and partners

· Perform other tasks as needed

Required skills

· A minimum of Bachelor’s degree in social science, agricultural science or related field

· Technical experience and demonstrate research and writing skills agriculture development and institution capacity building preferred.

· Solid communication, organizational and writing skills

· Demonstrated coordination and facilitation experience required

· Excellent Interpersonal skills

· Ability to multi-task and manage competing priorities

· Fluency in French and English is required.

Entry to Mid-Level Monitoring & Evaluation Associate

Responsibilities

· Provide technical assistance and support to the design and implementation of organizational related M&E activities, including performance monitoring plan development, indicator definition, data collection tools and methodologies, data entry, analysis and reporting

· Assist in monitoring, documenting and communicating the processes, challenges, and achievements of implementation of the organization’s activities in both qualitative and quantitative dimensions

· Ensure timely collection (e.g., surveys, interviews), storage and processing of data in electronic applications systems

· Develop organization’s M&E application standards and procedures and tools

· Keep stakeholders (e.g. Supervisors, Directors, Stakeholders) informed of all program results and challenges identified in the M&E process

· Assist in developing and writing up results and success stories for organizational reports, and any marketing materials for the project

· Assist in the dissemination of various program documents such as newsletters, success stories and other related documents to various stakeholders when required

· Support the M&E team with entry and management of data by ensuring that data entered is accurate, timely and of the required quality

· Provide support during assessment activities, meetings and workshops carried out by the organization in capturing key data and entering data on results of institutional assessments and capacity building needs

· Communicate and interpret between English and French speaking individuals as necessary with external and internal stakeholders

· Transcribe reports, documents, forms and other technical materials between English and French as necessary

· Suggest overall M&E system improvement tools and procedures

· Perform other related duties as assigned

Required skills

· A minimum of Bachelor’s degree in social science, agricultural science or related field

· Strong written & verbal communication skills, demonstrated research, data collection, report writing skills

· Creating, compiling, or presenting report skills is a plus

· Comfort with numbers, calculations, statistics and analytical skills is a plus

· Computer skills, comfort with the ability to develop forms as well as data entry and analysis

· MS Office (e.g., Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Access) preferred

· Attention to detail, ability to monitor own work and ability to work in a team environment

· Ability to manage own workload, handling multiple tasks simultaneously, prioritizing and responding in a timely manner on monitoring & evaluation issues

· English/French Bilingual required written and oral communication.

HOW TO APPLY:

Nationals of ECOWAS countries welcome to apply. Please send applications to:AfricaLEAD_Internships@dai.com by March 18, 2016 5:00PM GMT