PROGRAMME OFFICER AGROECOLOGY

Duty station: Mtwara-Masasi

Background:

SWISSAID is a non-government organization headquartered in Switzerland with operations in nine countries. It has operated in Tanzania since 1972, focusing on small-scale farming, gender equality, and extractives. Swissaid Tanzania is implementing a CROPS4HD project in Lindi, Mtwara, Dodoma, Dar es Salaam, Pwani, and Morogoro, whereby the focus production regions are Lindi and Mtwara. The programme officer will be based in Masasi in the Mtwara region, providing technical support to small-scale farmers on ecological organic agriculture in project areas.

The following are the project’s key outcomes:

Outcome 1: The demand of urban and rural consumers for products from farmers’ varieties/ landraces, neglected and underutilized species, and a healthy diet is increased.
Outcome 2: Smallholder farmers, especially women, grow farmers’ varieties/ landraces and neglected and underutilized species as a viable business and improve their livelihoods.
Outcome 3: Regulatory frameworks, strategies, and policies at local, national, sub-regional, and global levels reflect the particularities of integrated seed systems, create an enabling environment for innovative market approaches and incentivize the consumption of healthy, diverse, and agroecologically produced food.

Areas of intervention on small-scale farming:

Increasing smallholder farmers’ productivity and production through diversified agroecological farming.
Improving smallholder farmers’ capacity to generate net income through productive agroecological value chains.
Strengthening smallholder farmers’ organizations to enhance sustainability and accountability.

Regions of operation:

Field operations are mainly taking place in the regions of Mtwara and Lindi, but also to a limited extent in Ruvuma, Pwani and other regions.

Further information on SWISSAID is available at www.swissaid.ch ; and further information on agroecology is available at www.fao.org/agroecology/en/

Job purpose:

As part of Swissaid Tanzania Country Programme 2019-2024, contribute to Outcome 1 “Improved sustainable rural livelihoods of smallholder farmers” and to its Output 1 “Increased smallholder farmers’ production through diversified agroecological farming”.

Some of the key duties and responsibilities:

• Take a leading role in coordinating and implementing activities related to ecological farming.
• Coordinate the implementation of the training plan across farmer organizations and other possible partners including organizing training sessions for animators/lead farmers farmer groups and contributing the production of training materials.
• Coordinate implementation of participatory plant breeding and participatory cultivar evaluations through mother and baby seed trials
• Coordinate the establishment of community seed banks and provide technical assistance to the seed guardian and community seed banks’ members.
• Coordinate annual seed fairs and participate in community awareness creation and promotion of farmer-managed seeds.
• Provide technical backstopping on agroecology and conduct regular field visits to farmer groups in remote areas.
• Participate in project development including proposal writing.
• Ensure a good and constructive collaboration with other team members.
• Prepare detailed activity and monthly reports and effectively contribute to quarterly and annual reporting
• Support other projects as needed and foster good coordination and synergies with other elements of the Country Programme.
• Participate in planning, financial management and monitoring & evaluation related to the Country Programme.

Qualifications and experience:

• Hold a first university degree in agronomy, with a minimum of five years working experience in an area related to agronomy.
• Significant experience in ecological organic agriculture/agroecology.
• Demonstrated experience with project management and leadership, with the capacity to effectively manage multi-years projects and lead a team of up to 10 people.
• Interest and experience with grassroots communities in the agriculture sector.
• Practical experience in project designing and proposal writing.
• Practical experience in participatory plant research activities
• Practical experience and interest in working with partners including the government, civil society organizations, academia, and the private sector.
• A commitment to equal opportunities and promotion of gender equity.
• High-level analytical and report-writing skills in English.
• Fluent in English and Swahili.
• Must be computer literate.
• Ability to work independently, multitask, and under pressure.
• Focused on results.
• A team player.

Programme Officer Agroecology at SWISSAID