Background

The project Promoting rural agriculture development and quality employment for the most vulnerable (EMAG) is financed by the European Union and implemented by UNDP to support Moldova’s transition from crisis response toward long-term resilience, inclusive growth, and EU-aligned reforms. Building on EU–Moldova priorities in employment, labour market modernization, and agricultural governance, the project promotes an integrated approach that links employment services, social protection, and agricultural support through digitally enabled service delivery. By strengthening institutional capacities and modernizing core digital public services - particularly those serving vulnerable rural populations - the project aims to improve access, transparency, and effectiveness of public support measures, while contributing to Moldova’s broader reform agenda on modernization, social inclusion, and sustainable rural development.

In 2025, the Republic of Moldova continues to navigate a challenging socioeconomic and geopolitical context. The country is transitioning from crisis response to longer-term resilience building, while its reform agenda – centered on economic modernization, energy transition, and governance strengthening – is being tested amid rising regional risks, growing public expectations, and constrained fiscal space.

Agriculture remains a central sector of the Moldovan economy, employing over one-fifth of the workforce and contributing around 12% of GDP. Including food processing, the agri-food sector accounts for 16% of GDP and 45% of total exports. Moldova’s fertile land supports diverse production and underpins the rural economy. However, the sector is characterized by a dual structure: large, competitive enterprises coexist with numerous small, low-productivity farms. Informality is widespread, with more than half of salaried agricultural workers employed without formal contracts.

Digital modernization of public services in both employment and agriculture is progressing but remains uneven. Key institutions continue to operate with fragmented data systems, weak interoperability, and limited analytical capacity. These gaps hinder policy implementation, reduce the effectiveness of subsidies and services, and limit the state’s ability to engage the most vulnerable rural populations.

In this context, the Project seeks to contribute to labour market inclusion and agricultural modernization through digitally enabled service delivery. UNDP’s engagement is focused on integrated and inclusive approaches – linking social protection, employment, and agricultural services through modern digital infrastructure and case management. Building on past experience in digital governance and service modernization, the initiative is well positioned to deliver scalable results that can be institutionalized and sustained beyond the project’s duration. It will contribute to Moldova’s broader objectives of fostering decent work, rural development, and sustainable EU-aligned transformation.

The project aims to strengthen Moldova’s institutional and digital governance systems in order to expand access to employment and modernize agricultural service delivery for vulnerable rural populations. Its focus is on enabling hard-to-employ individuals and farmers to benefit from more efficient, inclusive, and transparent public services.

On the employment side, the initiative seeks to make social protection and labour market services more accessible and better integrated, supported by digitally re-engineered institutional frameworks. 

In agriculture, the project will help farmers across the country, including smallholders and underrepresented groups, access modernized services that are transparent, equitable, and aligned with Moldova’s reform agenda and EU commitments.

The project directly supports Moldova’s EU accession process by advancing the implementation of the Reform Agenda, in particular subdomain 1.7 on agriculture and subdomain 4.3 on employment and labour markets. Within the agricultural sector, the initiative contributes to the operationalization of the digital National Farmers Registry (dNFR) and the Land Parcel Identification System (LPIS), both of which are prerequisites for Moldova’s compliance with the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) requirements under Chapter 11. The project also aims to strengthen transparency and accountability in agricultural governance through the introduction of conditionality and compliance mechanisms.

Institutional support will be provided to the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry (MAFI) and the Agency for Intervention and Payments in Agriculture (AIPA) to reinforce their capacity to manage digital tools, improve administrative frameworks, and ensure transparent subsidy management. These reforms will be complemented by inclusive outreach measures to ensure equitable access to digital agricultural services for smallholders, women, and rural youth, fostering resilience and participation across rural communities.

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality, and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence.

UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.
UNDP is the leading United Nations organization working to end poverty, inequality, and climate change. With a presence in 170 countries, UNDP partners with governments, civil society, and the private sector to help build integrated, lasting solutions for people and planet.

Duties and Responsibilities

UNDP Moldova seeks to contract a Backend Development Analyst (hereinafter “the Developer”) to support the Digital National Farmers Registry (dNFR) by reviewing, adjusting, and strengthening backend services and integrations required to enable compliant user-facing changes and ensure reliable system operation. The assignment will focus on analysing the existing dNFR backend architecture, identifying gaps against functional, security, interoperability, and performance requirements, and implementing the necessary backend updates to support consistent user journeys, accessibility-related behaviours (where driven by backend responses), and stable data exchange across the system.

The Developer will work under the framework of the “Promoting Rural Agriculture Development and Quality Employment for The Most Vulnerable” EMAG Project as part of an interdisciplinary team supporting agricultural modernization and digital governance. The Developer will coordinate with the designated technical team of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry (MAFI) and the Moldova Electronic Governance Agency to confirm requirements, validate deliverables, and align implementation sequencing with operational needs, while retaining responsibility for the end-to-end execution of the backend adjustments within the agreed scope.

The Developer will carry out the full implementation cycle, including backend code review and refactoring, API and business-logic updates, data-model adjustments where required, integration hardening with government digital services, performance optimization, logging/monitoring improvements, and resolution of defects identified during testing. The assignment will also include preparing and maintaining technical documentation of the changes delivered (e.g., updated API specifications, integration notes, change logs, and release notes) and supporting user acceptance by addressing observations and finalizing backend changes for deployment.

More specifically, the Backend Development Analyst will be responsible for:

Ensure effective implementation of backend services for the dNFR informational system 

  • Design and implement back-end services for key sections, including but not limited to:
    • Persons Registry: CRUD operations for natural/legal persons, bank accounts, addresses, identity data, and connections/authorizations.
    • Farm Registry: Management of agricultural holdings, farm data (e.g., activities, members, animals, cadastral parcels, crop plans, machinery, buildings), attachments, and print generation (e.g., PDF exports).
    • LPIS Module: Handling land parcel data, crop planning, and integrations with GIS systems.
  • Develop RESTful APIs for data operations, search queries, and integrations (e.g., importing animal data from external databases).
  • Implement business logic, such as automatic code generation (e.g., holding codes), validations (e.g., 13-digit IDNP, 15-digit bank accounts), status management (e.g., active/deactivate, VALID/CHECK), and calculations (e.g., area Remaining in crop plans).
  • Manage database schema, queries, and optimizations for efficient data retrieval and storage.
  • Handle integrations with external systems (e.g., animal identification database, LPIS for parcels).
  • Ensure security features, including authentication, authorization (based on user privileges), data encryption, and audit logging.
  • Implement error handling, logging, and performance monitoring.
  • Conduct unit/integration testing and debugging.
  • Use version control (Git) and participate in code reviews.
  • Document APIs (e.g., using Swagger) and provide knowledge transfer.

Technical review and requirements alignment

  • Review and validate backend specifications provided by the project team to ensure they are technically feasible, consistent, and aligned with system architecture and operational constraints.
  • Analyse backend workflows and implementations to verify compliance with security, interoperability, performance, and maintainability standards.
  • Assist in refining backend requirements and technical documentation by providing expert input and identifying potential risks, technical debt, or inefficiencies.
  • Support change management processes by contributing to the preparation/review of technical user documentation (as it relates to backend behaviour, roles/permissions, integrations, and data rules) and reviewing training materials for technical accuracy.
  • Ensure user feedback and bug reports are addressed by validating fixes and improvements implemented by contractors, including regression checks and deployment readiness verification.

The incumbent performs other duties within their functional profile as deemed necessary for the efficient functioning of the Office and the Organization.

Institutional Arrangement

The Developer will work under the supervision of the EMAG Project Manager, in close cooperation with the UNDP Moldova Country Office Digital Development Specialist and overall project team, for an effective achievement of results, anticipating and contributing to resolving project-related issues and information delivery.

He/she also will collaborate with other UN projects, the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry, Moldova Electrnonic Governance Agency, and other national stakeholders. The incumbent is expected to exercise full compliance with UNDP administrative rules, regulations, policies and strategies.

Competencies

Core Competencies

Achieve results - LEVEL 1: Plans and monitors own work, pays attention to details, delivers quality work by deadline

Think Innovatively - LEVEL 1: Open to creative ideas/known risks, is pragmatic problem solver, makes improvements

Learn Continuously - LEVEL 1: Open minded and curious, shares knowledge, learns from mistakes, asks for feedback

Adapt with Agility - LEVEL 1: Adapts to change, constructively handles ambiguity/uncertainty, is flexible

Act with determination - LEVEL 1: Shows drive and motivation, able to deliver calmly in face of adversity, confident

Engage and Partner - LEVEL 1: Demonstrates compassion/understanding towards others, forms positive relationships

Enable Diversity and Inclusion - LEVEL 1: Appreciate/respect differences, aware of unconscious bias, confront discrimination  

Cross-Functional and Technical Competencies

Business Development - Human-Centered Design:    

  • Ability to develop solutions to problems by involving the human perspective in all steps of the problem-solving process. 
  • Knowledge and understanding of human-centred design principles and practices.

Business Direction & Strategy - Digital Awareness and Literacy:    

  • Ability to monitor new and emerging technologies, as well as understand their usage, potential, limitations, impact, and added value. 
  • Ability to rapidly and readily adopt and use new technologies in professional activities, and to empower others to use them as needed. 
  • Knowledge of the usage of digital technologies and emerging trends.

Business Direction & Strategy - System Thinking:    

  • Ability to use objective problem analysis and judgement to understand how interrelated elements coexist within an overall process or system, and to consider how altering one element can impact on other parts of the system. 

Business Development - Knowledge Facilitation:     

  • Ability to animate individuals and communities of contributors to participate and share, particularly externally. 

Digital - Data analysis:     

  • Ability to extract, analyze and visualize data (including Real-Time Data) to form meaningful insights and aid effective decision making. 

Digital - Digital transformation design:     

  • Practical and strategic skills in digital transformation for governments and organizations. 

Digital - Facilitation of digital innovation practices:    

  • Ability to facilitate groups and individuals through a digital innovation process.

Required Skills and Experience

Minimum Education Requirements:

  • Advanced university degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or related field(s); OR  
  • A first-level university degree (Bachelor’s degree) in the areas mentioned above in combination with an additional two (2) years of qualifying experience will be given due consideration in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Minimum years of relevant work experience:

  • Minimum 2 years (with Master’s degree) or 4 years (with Bachelor’s degree) of progressively responsible relevant experience (at the national or international level) in backend software development. 

Required skills:

  • Minimum experience of 2 years in backend development using one or more modern stacks/frameworks (e.g. Java 11 or higher/OSGI, Spring Boot, or equivalent).
  • Demonstrated experience implementing RESTful APIs, including input validation, error handling, pagination/filtering, and API documentation; 
  • Demonstrated experience with server-side languages such as Java 11 or higher/OSGI  (preferred, based on common practices for similar systems) or Java with Spring Boot.

Desired skills:   

  • Experience with integrations, microservices, and external APIs/databases.
  • Familiarity with GIS data handling (e.g., PostGIS for LPIS spatial data).
  • Knowledge of security protocols (e.g. JWT, OAuth), caching (e.g. Redis), and cloud services (e.g. Azure or AWS).
  • Experience with version control (Git), agile methodologies, and tools like Jira or Trello.
  • Previous experience in digital transformation projects within the public sector or in collaboration with governmental institutions and or agricultural data systems is an advantage.

Required Language(s): 

  • Fluency in English and Romanian is required.
  • Knowledge of one or more minority languages relevant for Moldova, including Russian, Romani, Gagauzian, Bulgarian, Ukrainian and sign language, is an asset.

Professional Certificates:    

  • Additional training and/or certification relevant to backend engineering and secure software delivery (e.g., Java/Spring certifications, secure coding, cloud certifications) would be an advantage.

Equal opportunity

As an equal opportunity employer, UNDP values diversity as an expression of the multiplicity of nations and cultures where we operate and, as such, we encourage qualified applicants from all backgrounds to apply for roles in the organization. Our employment decisions are based on merit and suitability for the role, without discrimination. 

UNDP is also committed to creating an inclusive workplace where all personnel are empowered to contribute to our mission, are valued, can thrive, and benefit from career opportunities that are open to all.

Sexual harassment, exploitation, and abuse of authority

UNDP does not tolerate harassment, sexual harassment, exploitation, discrimination and abuse of authority. All selected candidates, therefore, undergo relevant checks and are expected to adhere to the respective standards and principles. 

Right to select multiple candidates

UNDP reserves the right to select one or more candidates from this vacancy announcement.  We may also retain applications and consider candidates applying to this post for other similar positions with UNDP at the same grade level and with similar job description, experience and educational requirements.

Scam alert

UNDP does not charge a fee at any stage of its recruitment process. For further information, please see www.undp.org/scam-alert.

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