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Land and Water Management Specialist

Lilongwe

  • Organization: FAO - Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
  • Location: Lilongwe
  • Grade: Level not specified - Level not specified
  • Occupational Groups:
    • Environment
    • Human Settlements (Shelter, Housing, Land, Property)
    • Water Resource Management
    • FAO REPRESENTATION MALAWI
  • Closing Date: Closed

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FAO is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender and nationality.

Persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply.

All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence.

The incumbent may be re-assigned to different activities and/or duty stations

depending on the evolving needs of the Organization 

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Organizational Setting
Through its Country Offices, or FAO Representations, FAO assists governments to develop policies, programmes and projects to address hunger and malnutrition, and provides technical support for the sustainable development of their agricultural, fisheries and forestry sectors and to respond to crises. The Land and Water Management Specialist will be hired under project GCP/MLW/072/EC - KULIMA; Revitalizing agricultural clusters and Ulimi wa Mdandanda through Farmer field schools in Malawi, a 5 year project in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development, Malawi funded by the European Union. The main project objective is to promote sustainable agricultural growth and incomes to enhance food and nutrition security in Malawi within the context of a changing climate. This action has been conceived to support the District Agricultural Extension Services System (DAESS) to ensure sustainable increase of agricultural productivity and diversified production. This will be attained through building capacity of a pool of FFS Master Trainers and community based facilitators to be drawn from selected farming communities. The availability of highly qualified FFS Master Trainers and Community Based facilitators will facilitate the overall empowerment of the farmers to address the various issues affecting the production, productivity, nutrition and access to market.
 
Reporting Lines
 
The International Land and Water Management Specialist will be under the overall supervision of the FAO Representative in Malawi and the direct operational supervision of KULIMA Chief Technical Advisor and he or she will work in close collaboration with the KULIMA co-Facilitators; resilience Pillar Technical Advisor and the Assistant FAO Representative (Programme).
 
Technical Focus
 
The International FFS Specialist will be responsible for conducting Farmer Field School Master Trainers’ Courses for KULIMA Extension Workers and oversee the Training of facilitators’ courses for Community Based Facilitators.  The training will be intensive and full of practical sessions (65%), theory (25%) and outreach (10%). The participants will be systematically taken through various concepts and tools with emphasis on relating their applicability in their own local context. In addition to the traditional FFS agroecosystem based content on sustainable good agricultural husbandry/practices, natural resources management and innovative adaptations to climate change, purposive inclusions will be made to broaden the MT course curriculum to include modules on nutrition sensitive agriculture; Farmer Business School (FBS) - entrepreneurial skills development and farming as a business (enterprise selection, gross margin analysis, profitability analysis, farm budgets, enterprise planning, cost benefit analysis and enterprise records); post-harvest handling; marketing and value chain analysis; savings mobilization and key cross cutting issues.
 
 
Tasks and responsibilities
 
The incumbent will work more specifically\:
 
  • Provide technical support and guidance to the FAO Malawi Team with the adoption of the Integrated Catchment Management activities (ICM) for the community outreach in FAO project/interventions;
 
  • Undertake technical appraisal in the ground, particularly in locations in which the adoption of the ICM approach represents an added value for the implementation of FAO interventions.  The interventions related with  Nutrition Sensitive Agriculture, Community-based resilience building, Capacity building for Agriculture Extension, Climate Change Adaptation and improvement of productivity will be prioritized;
 
  • Conduct community-based analysis along the catchment areas selected for different interventions in the different FAO projects, particularly in districts in which EU-funded resilience-building activities are currently taking place;
 
  • Contribute to the development of guidelines and training modules on ICM to be integrated in the Farmer Field Schools curriculum; develop natural resource management guide for FFS facilitators and participate in facilitators’ trainings to ensure proper identification of ICM activities at community level;
 
  • Provide technical guidance and mentorship to local trainers seconded by the Ministry of Agriculture in case is needed.
 
  • Tailor existing standard operating procedures/technical approaches that FAO Malawi can adopt in its implementation on Water Harvesting and ICM activities for successful implementation of KULIMA and other projects in close collaboration with competent authorities and relevant stakeholders;
 
  • Provide  technical support to all FAO Field Managers in any of their tasks related to natural resource management, ICM in particular the identification, design, implementation and monitoring of activities such as watershed management, water harvesting, construction of sub-surface dam and associated shallow wells, climate smart agriculture technologies and practices such as soil and water conservation measures and water availability for production activities, ensuring that these interventions are designed based on participatory hazard risk diagnosis and vulnerability assessments;
 
  • Backstop implementing agreements and ensure sound implementation of technical activities included in the Letters of Agreement subscribed between Implementing Partners and FAO Malawi.
 
  • Support the delineation of selected micro-catchments, following up the harmonization of this exercise with the hot spot mapping exercise on selected micro catchments, at least 6 during the contracting period;
 
  • Perform any other related task requested by the FAO Representative or the Resilience Officer.
 
 
CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING
 
 
Minimum Requirements
 
  • Advanced university degree (for Consultants) / University degree (for PSAs) in Agriculture/Water Engineering, Natural Resources Management and Environmental management.  It is required a strong focus on Land and Water Management activities.
  • Working knowledge of English, French or Spanish and limited knowledge of one of the other two, or of Arabic, Chinese or Russian (for Consultants). Working knowledge of English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian or Chinese (for PSAs)
  • At least 10 years of relevant experience in the field of ICM, Climate Change Adaptation and Rural Development, with strong field experience in Soil and Water Management activities.
 
 
FAO Core Competencies
  • Results Focus
  • Teamwork
  • Communication
  • Building Effective Relationships
  • Knowledge Sharing and Continuous Improvement
 
Technical/Functional Skills
  • Strong field experience with close working relationships with communities
  • Experience in Africa in general and the Southern Region of Africa in particular.
  • Working experience with NGO, Government and the United Nations system is an asset.
  • Demonstrated previous experience working with the field school approach implementation
  • Knowledge of FAO FFS methodology is an asset.
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 Please note that all candidates should adhere to FAO Values of Commitment to FAO,

Respect for All and Integrity and Transparency 

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ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
  • FAO does not charge a fee at any stage of the recruitment process (application, interview, processing).
  • Please note that FAO will only consider academic credentials or degrees obtained from an educational institution recognised in the IAU/UNESCO list.
  • Only language proficiency certificates from UN accredited external providers and/or FAO language official examinations (LPE, ILE, LRT) will be accepted as proof of the level of knowledge of languages indicated in the online applications.
  • Candidates with acceptable language certificate/s should upload them when submitting their application. For details, visit http\://www.fao.org/3/I8446EN/i8446en.pdf
  • For other issues, visit the FAO employment website\: http\://www.fao.org/employment/home/en/
  • For further information on categories, contract duration and honoraria, please refer to the Conditions page.
 
HOW TO APPLY
 
To apply, visit the recruitment website at Jobs at FAO and complete your online profile. Incomplete applications will not be considered. Only applications received through the recruitment portal will be considered.
 
Vacancies will be removed from the recruitment portal at 23\:59 Central European Time (CET) on the deadline for applications date. We encourage applicants to submit the application well before the deadline date.
 
If you need help, or have queries, please contact\: iRecruitment@fao.org
 

FAO IS A NON-SMOKING ENVIRONMENT

This vacancy is now closed.
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