Country Coordinator at International Institute of Tropical Agriculture

International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) is an international non-profit agricultural research-for-development (R4D) organization established in 1967, governed by a Board of Trustees, and a member of the CGIAR Consortium. Our R4D approach is anchored on the development needs of tropical nations. We work with partners to enhance crop quality and productivity, reduce producer and consumer risks, and generate wealth from agriculture. We have more than 100 internationally recruited scientists from about 35 countries and 900 nationally recruited staff based in various stations across Africa. Please visit http://www.iita.org/ for more information on IITA.

The Putting Nitrogen Fixation to Work for Smallholder Farmers in Africa (http://www.n2africa.org) Project is led by Wageningen University, the Netherlands. The project will deploy state-of-the-art legume and rhizobial inoculant technologies to African smallholder farmers to enhance inputs of free atmospheric nitrogen by biological nitrogen fixation, thereby improving legume productivity, human nutrition and farm income, while enhancing soil health. In its second phase, the project will put a major emphasis on (i) institutionalizing N2Africa technologies, approaches, and expertise and (ii) fostering sustainability of the various components addressed by N2Africa, including seed, inoculant, and fertilizer supply chains, access to profitable legume markets, and knowledge transfer. The project will primarily work in Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda, and Ethiopia (with a limited range of activities in DR Congo, Rwanda, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Malawi, and Mozambique).

IITA seeks a qualified Country Coordinator Nigeria to lead the implementation of N2Africa activities in Nigeria. The Country Coordinator will assemble all project partners towards the development of mutually agreed upon work plans, monitor their implementation, ensure technical and financial reporting is completed in line with project requirements, and facilitate partnerships with the science and development community towards delivery of N2Africa products at scale. Because of the ‘federal’ organization of the second phase of the project, Country Coordinators need to be creative in ensuring that the project works effectively within their country whilst maintaining standard protocols to allow cross-comparison across countries.

The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) invites applications for the position of Country Coordinator, N2Africa Nigeria.

Job Title: Country Coordinator, N2Africa, Nigeria

Ref No: DDG-R4D/N2A/CCN/12/13
Location: Kano

Job Description
The successful candidate will report to the R4D Director on Natural Resource Management and the R4D Director for West Africa.

More specifically the Country Coordinator will:

• Lead the implementation of all project activities
• Constitute in-country teams with the required expertise for specific action plans
• Facilitate partnerships with dissemination and market partners
• Lead technical and financial reporting to the project leadership
• Oversee the science of N2Africa within the country
• Represent N2Africa within the country to various stakeholder groups
• Engage with the M&E specialist to ensure that M&E tools are administered in a timely manner
• Engage with the Senior Business Development Officer to explore opportunities for partnerships for developing input and output market for the target legumes
• Participate in and/or organize technical meetings, conference calls and consultations of experts from stakeholder and partner organizations as required in liaison with the Project Coordinator as required.
• Facilitate the institutionalization of N2Africa into a national system
• (Co)-supervise of MSc and PhD projects.

Educational Qualifications
The applicant will have a PhD in agronomy, soil microbiology, or a related field and have demonstrated expertise (at least 5 years) in research for/or development within African smallholder farming systems.

Core Competencies:

• Proven expertise with facilitating networks of partners across the research to development continuum.
• Excellent knowledge of legume agronomy and the role legumes play in relation to rural livelihoods.
• Excellent knowledge of the essential components and bottlenecks in legume input supply and output market value chains.
• Ability to manage own workload without close supervision and work independently, making decisions and solving problems on routine and complex problems.
• Ability to work effectively in a dynamic team environment, in a flexible office environment with periods of high pressure activity.
• Team player with personality traits that enable him/her to motivate and communicate with all levels of the professional and support staff.
• Reputation of integrity, high intelligence, creativity and the ability to exercise good judgment.
• Strong interpersonal skills and an ability to establish rapport and credibility with people at all organizational levels, forming strong relationships, both internally and externally.
• Committed to transparency and continuous improvement in a cooperative atmosphere of constructive evaluation and learning.
• Willingness to travel extensively.
• Excellent spoken and written English.

General information: Initial appointment is for two years. IITA offers a competitive remuneration package paid in US dollars.

Application Closing Date:
20th February, 2014

Method of Applications:
Applications which must include covering letter, curriculum vitae, names and addresses of three referees should be addressed to the Head, Human Resources Service. Please complete our online application form using this link: http://www.iita.org/irs-online-application

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