Livestock Early Warning Systems Specialist

Organizational Setting

The main aim of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) country offices, which are headed by a FAO Representative, is to assist governments to develop policies, programs and projects to achieve food security and to reduce hunger and malnutrition, to develop the agricultural, fisheries and forestry sectors, and to use their environmental and natural resources in a sustainable manner. The FAO Representation Office in Ethiopia provides technical assistance to the Government of Ethiopia on agriculture, livestock, fishery, forestry, and crosscutting sectors such as nutrition, social protection, resilience, gender, strengthening the evidence base, among others.

The mission of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is to work to eradicate hunger and promote global food security together with balanced and complete nutrition. Our mandate is to raise levels of nutrition, improve agricultural productivity, better the lives of rural populations and contribute to the growth of the world economy.

Our three main goals are: the eradication of hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition; the elimination of poverty and the driving forward of economic and social progress for all; and, the sustainable management and utilization of natural resources, including land, water, air, climate and genetic resources for the benefit of present and future generations.

FAO Ethiopia was awarded the Support to effective food security, nutrition and resilience programming in Ethiopia by the European Union (EU) with an overarching objective of ensuring implementation of humanitarian food and resilience building livelihood interventions will have been enhanced. Among other activities, the project intends to support the Ministry of Agriculture to develop and implement crop and livestock early warning systems. The project also plans to support the policy environment to address food insecurity and vulnerability. In this regard, new early warning system and monitoring tools such as Livestock and Crop conditions monitoring including Pictorial Evaluation Tools, Agriculture Stress Index, feed inventory, and Predictive Livestock Early Warning Systems (PLEWS) will be integrated into the National Early Warning System.

Reporting Lines

The Livestock Early Warning Systems Specialist will work under the overall supervision of the FAO Representative (FAOR) in Ethiopia and, specifically, under the technical and direct supervision of the Technical Adviser for Food Security.

Technical Focus

The focus of the assignment is the implementation of agriculture sector early warning systems related to crops and livestock sectors. Crop livestock early warning systems include Agriculture Stress Index Systems (ASIS) while Livestock Early Warning Systems includes Pictorial Evaluation Tools (PET) and Predictive Livestock Early Warning Systems (PLEWS). In addition to this, the post holder will also lead analysis of remote sensing products and markets monitoring activities.

Tasks and responsibilities

The incumbent will perform the following tasks:

• Lead all field operations in the establishment and implementation of the livestock early warning systems activities for the roll out of Pictorial Evaluation Tools (PET) and Predictive Livestock Early Warning Systems (PLEWS);
• Work closely with the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) and Ethiopian Disaster Risk Management (EDRM) experts as well as technical trainers to ensure delivery a capacity-building program to ensure successful implementation of PET and PLEWS in Ethiopia;
• Ensure monthly PET data, analysis and production of monitoring reports;
• Coordinate collection data on impacts of hazards on the livestock sector in project implementation areas;
• Liaise with FAO field regional coordination offices, United Nations (UN) Agencies, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and other partners to ensure effective collaboration and coordination mechanisms on livestock early warning systems;
• Participate as part of FAO support for planned and ad hoc national food security assessments;
• Lead efforts of linking Agriculture and Disaster Risk Management technical experts in the data collection efforts to ensure integrated early warning systems are available at field level;
• Perform other related duties as required.

CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING

Minimum Requirements

• The candidate must be a national of Ethiopia.
• Master’s degree in Livestock production; Veterinary Sciences; Rural Development and Food Security, Agricultural Economics, Agro-meteorology or related fields.
• Minimum of seven years of relevant experience in Livestock production, food security analysis, dissemination of early warning systems, coordination with partners, project management and working with multidisciplinary technical teams.
• Working knowledge of English and good knowledge of the local language(s) used at the duty station is required.

FAO Core Competencies

• Results Focus
• Teamwork
• Communication
• Building Effective Relationships
• Knowledge Sharing and Continuous Improvement

Technical/Functional Skills

• Work experience in more than one location or area of work;
• Extent and relevance of experience in food security, livelihoods, humanitarian response;
• Familiarity with Ethiopian government early warning systems and how they are coordinated among different stakeholders;
• Good technical writing skills.

Selection Criteria

• Extent and depth of knowledge and experience working on area-level or national livestock early warning systems;
• In-depth knowledge and demonstrated expertise in food security and early warning information systems, and early warning systems policy environment in Ethiopia;
• Demonstrated ability in design and implement integrated early warning systems;
• Demonstrated capacity to support/facilitate trainings and conduct analysis;
• Strong communication, writing and presentation skills in English.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION