WFP is partnering with the Mastercard Foundation (MCF) for a five-year 130 million USD partnership titled ‘Strengthening food systems to promote increased value chain employment opportunities for youth’. This partnership, which aims to strengthen local food systems and making them more efficient, sustainable and inclusive for youth, in particular young women, will be implemented in eight Country Offices, in three different regions: East Africa (Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda); Southern Africa (Tanzania, Mozambique) and West Africa (Ghana, Nigeria, and Senegal). In each of these countries, the programme will adopt an integrated value chain approach to implement context-specific interventions aimed at reaching the following outcomes:

• Young people, especially women, have improved employment opportunities along the value chain

• Smallholder farmers, especially youth and women, increase the value of their sales, resulting in improved income

• Smallholder farmers, especially youth and women, reduce post-harvest losses and improve the quality for targeted crops

• Improved inclusiveness of marginalized groups in agricultural value chains

• Improved value chain efficiency for young people, in particular women

The programme will focus on reducing post-harvest losses and increasing the access of smallholder farmers to reliable and remunerative market opportunities for a range of different crops. In complement to those core intervention areas, the partnership will introduce innovative access to finance solutions to the benefit of key value chain actors, as well as a range of other innovative digital solutions to strengthen the performance of those actors and improve overall the overall efficiency of the targeted value chains.

THE ROLE

WFP is seeking to recruit a Senior Programme Policy Officer (P4 level) to carry out the daily management of the programme as Deputy Coordinator, providing technical advice and oversight, liaising with the different Regional Bureaux and Country Offices, the Foundation counterparts and other stakeholders. The Deputy Coordinator will be supervising a team of experts based in HQ and at the Regional Bureaux. The incumbent will operate under the direct supervision of the Programme Global Coordinator and overall guidance of the Chief of the Small Holder Support and Food System Unit (PROR-F).

KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES (not all-inclusive)

The selected person will be responsible for carrying out the following tasks and responsibilities:

Global, Regional and National Programme management

• In line with WFP’s Strategic Plan, lead the operationalization of the programme at global, regional and national level; Work closely with WFP’s Regional and Country Offices to help them identify, develop and steward relationships with the Foundation and provide guidance and tools to maximize the impact of the country project engagement, while ensuring strategic focus and alignment with organizational goals;
• In close coordination with the teams in the field, lead the implementation of field activities in the eight country offices (COs) by providing managerial and technical advice to Senior Management and technical teams on value chains development and women empowerment;
• Establish and manage strong communication and coordination frameworks with the COs and Regional Bureaus (RBs) technical and operational units to promote synergies and effective coordination and enable the alignment and integration of the project with their strategic objectives and targets;
• Supervise Trust Fund budget management and annual narrative and financial reporting: Establish and oversee budget tracking with COs and RBs in line with WFP rules and regulations and project financial reporting requirements;
• Supervise the ongoing activities in the field, continuously monitor project implementation and progress in adherence to comprehensive workplans and supervise M&E work, ensuring that Programme approaches are mainstreamed across the 8 countries.

Strategic Partnership Management

• Assert WFP’s leadership status in different forums with the Foundation counterpart senior officers, government officials, partners, and donors to advocate for strategic partnerships as required;
• Provide solid technical and managerial leadership in WFP’s strategic engagement with the Foundation through setting up and managing the programme governance, coordination and technical support framework and structures.

Specialized Programmatic Support to COs

• Guide WFP COs in the coherent and effective planning of programme activities based on a solid analysis of the context; guide the implementation of programme activities, advising on the integration of MCF activities with other core programmatic areas (e.g. Food Systems, Resilience and livelihoods, social protection, etc.) in Country Strategic Programmes;
• Provide support to the COs mainstream key features of the Programme to ensure that they progressively become part of a coherent country approach where inclusive market access, innovative financing and youth & women employment in agriculture value chains are important elements of the changing lives agenda;
• Lead the provision of guidance to the COs on broad thematic areas, in which the incumbent should have solid knowledge and expertise; in particular leading the coordination, development and update of technical guidance material for CO-level implementation, in the area of market access, Post harvest losses (PHL), gender, youth employment and M&E, in close consultation with other PROR-F teams and the gender unit, leading their engagement and integration of projects with Smallholder Agriculture Market Support (SAMS), PHL, Food Systems;
• Supervise the technical Programme staff in HQ, including assessment of performance and enhancement of capabilities.

Evidence Generation, Measurement and Knowledge Management

• Develop and refine reporting strategies and engagements for COs and RBs to support WFP external and internal knowledge products as required by the Foundation; Nurture strategic and operational partnerships for complementary and collaborative approaches and initiatives that support related advocacy work within all relevant audiences.
• Coordinate and ensure support to COs in designing and implementing a rigorous Knowledge management and M&E system;
• Identify and develop a comprehensive research agenda for the project in close collaboration with the selected research institutes and the Foundation, leveraging on own experience and good understanding of research organizations;
• Supervise and support COs in the production of country-level narrative reports and the management of MCF budgets; lead the production of global financial and narrative reports as per agreement with the Foundation.
• Other as required.

STANDARD MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

Education:

• Advanced University degree in Agriculture, Agriculture Economics, International Development, International Relations, or other fields relevant to rural developments and food systems, or a First University Degree with additional years of related work experience and/or training/courses.

Experience:

• 8 or more years of professional experience developed in relevant organizations , matured in the field, relevant to agriculture, food systems, rural development, integrated resilience preferably contributing to food security and/or job creation objectives in Africa
• Experience in providing advice to senior management as well as technical assistance to support programme design in WFP country offices and headquarters is an asset
• Experience in managing complex partnerships with new donors is relevant to the position

Languages:

• Fluency (level C) in English language. Intermediate knowledge (level B) of French is an asset for this role.

MORE ABOUT YOU

You have:

• Knowledge of current thinking and developments in the field of food systems and agriculture value chain development, preferably in Africa; experience in managing and coordinating large programmes in the area of post-harvest losses management, youth employment creation in agriculture, small-holder access to market, women`s empowerment and integrated resilience programming would be important assets;
• Knowledge of CGIAR centers and experience in working with research organizations institutions is an asset
• Experience with other UN organizations and track record of supporting financial and other agriculture-related services is an asset
• Excellent teamwork and management skills; excellent communication and interpersonal skills; and good negotiation, problem-solving and decision-making skills
• Aptitude for leading, guiding, and empowering staff
• Ability to develop and maintain relationships with a variety of stakeholders, conveying an informed and professional demeanour toward internal and external partners and stakeholders
• Understanding WFP’s mandate, process, intervention modalities, programme and project lifecycle tools, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation is desirable
• Learning agility and appetite for exploring and experimenting with new ideas and approaches
• Demonstrated ability to produce high-quality written outputs and ability to present in English and the working language in use in the countries where the programme is implemented
• Ability to lead and coordinate a multi-cultural team
• Ability to manage large donor contribution, being accountable for resource management