Digital Green is launching a two years project “Advancing Conservation, Agriculture and Livelihoods in Oromia” financed by The David and Lucile Packard Foundation. Digital Green as lead organization is partnering with the Environment and Coffee Forest Forum (ECFF), to deliver the project objectives together with the local government offices. The Project Coordinator, will bring a sense of entrepreneurship and inventiveness to the in-country team as a whole with respect to integrating agriculture with Natural Resource Management (NRM) and livelihoods of the targeted farmers in Jimma zone of Oromia region. This is a tremendous opportunity for the right candidate to contribute significantly towards improving the lives of smallholder farmers within a well-respected, high-impact organization.

The Project Coordinator will report to Digital Green’s Program Director (based in Addis Ababa), helping to coordinate the implementation of the project and drive towards project objectives and farmer impact. The successful candidate will be a hands-on, initiative-taker, playing leading role in the management and coordination of on-ground level implementation of activities by laying strong foundations to smoothly run the project as per the agreed targets and objectives.

This position will require out-of-the box thinking, partnership management and project implementation skills in integrating agriculture and NRM with livelihoods, with the aim of developing climate resilient community and sustained mode of operations. He/she is a highly-skilled fast learner who is inquisitive in nature in order to find / determine “farmers’ needs” and “best solutions” to the various challenges smallholder farmers face. The mind-set of the project coordinator would be with a characteristic of cyclical learning approach: create + deploy + learn + iterate + re-deploy.

The candidate will also need to be adept in team collaboration among the NRM and agricultural sectors. The candidate should understand the importance of sharing learning’s to the wider team in writings and during specified forums and review sessions.

Key Responsibilities

• Scope-out on-ground opportunities to leverage ICTs (video-based technology platform and others) to further provide all necessary technical and managerial support to achieve project objectives.
• Identify priority topics in each woreda and finalize geographic focus and coordinate with Zonal and woreda offices of Agriculture and digital extension management committees (DEMCs)
• Ensure that implementation of the project activities is in accordance with the budget and timeframe stipulated in the project document and bring any deviation from the original plan to the attention of the Program Director.
• Work closely with MERL team in-country to contextualize NRM platforms, mitigate challenges, close project gaps, and to streamline operations for wider impact
• Support program implementation by leveraging an entrepreneurial lens and guiding field coordinators to further drive impact on-ground for smallholder farmers;
• Facilitate awareness and learning sessions to project teams in regarding NRM, Conservative Agriculture and key activities to be implemented
• Provide guidance and support to field coordinators and monitor their performances to ensure they deliver on areas of responsibility and key activities periodically
• Work closely and smoothly with the implementation partner (ECFF) and zonal and woreda government partners and other relevant stakeholders
• Coordinate and collaborate with ECFF team for periodic progress review and follow up and develop periodic plans, reports and case stories
• Ensure that the Projects’ operations and resource utilization are in compliance with Digital Green’s policies, donor requirements and government regulations.

Qualifications and Experiences

• Masters Degree in NRM, Rural Development, Agriculture, Livelihoods or related fields
• Minimum 6 years of experience in managing implementation of NRM and related agricultural projects.
• Experience in working with various ICT for Agriculture platforms focusing on improving the well-being of smallholder farmers is of a great advantage;
• Experience working with NGOs as well as private-sector agencies is a plus.

Skills and Competencies

• Knowledge of NRM, conservation/climate-smart agriculture, agronomy, value chains, livelihoods, gender and extension linkages, challenges and opportunities;
• Technical expertise in soil and water conservation, forest management and other related natural resources management;
• Understanding of country-specific agriculture extension structure in general and NRM in particular ;
• Leadership skills for project management and coordination of field team members;
• Passion and dedication to introduce innovations that will ultimately result in increased income across smallholder farmers;
• Strong willingness to deliver quality results to achieve organization’s ultimate aims;
• Ability to work well under pressure and oftentimes under tight deadlines;
• Ability to work within teams and with potential partners
• Ability to travel extensively to the project woredas in particular and to other zones and woredas when deemed necessary.

• Excellent command of written and spoken English. Knowledge of local language (Afaan Oromo) is of an advantage
• Proven negotiation and communication skills. Ability to professionally and effectively communicate with individuals, groups and institutions at various levels.

• Mature personality, result-oriented, problem-solving attitude and ability to work independently.