Business Development Officer UK Aid Project Jobs – Farm Africa

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Job Title:           Business
Development Officer
Organization: Farm
Africa
Project Name: Livestock
for Livelihoods (L4L) programme
Funding Source: UK
Aid
Duty Station: Uganda
Reports to: Project
Coordinator
About US:
Farm Africa is an international
non-governmental organization working to end hunger and bring prosperity to
rural Africa. We work to increase the incomes and improve food security of
smallholder farmers, pastoralists, agro-pastoralists, and forest dwellers in
East Africa. A core part of our strategy is to ensure that our interventions
are both economically sustainable and scalable. The systematic integration of
market linkages in implementing programmes is crucial to our ability to scale
our interventions cost-effectively. Farm Africa has the ambition to be the
leading European NGO specialising in Agriculture, Natural Resource Management
and Market Engagement.
About UK Aid Project:
Farm Africa was recently awarded
a £5m grant for a Livestock for Livelihoods (L4L) programme operating in
Uganda’s Karamoja sub-region and Ethiopia’s South Omo zone funded by the UK
government (UK Aid).The project will be implemented across four districts of
Karamoja sub-region (Moroto, Napak, Kotido & Nakapiripirit). During this
four year programme Farm Africa will work with local civil society, SMEs,
cooperatives and farmer organisations to develop market systems that support
livestock services and enterprises for 21,000 women, contributing to women’s
economic empowerment, reduced poverty and improved nutrition of women and
children. The project will address market failures in animal health and
breeding services to improve livestock productivity, build capacity and assets
of herders, establish trade and enterprise opportunities and improve household
nutrition practices through behavioural change. It will demonstrate how
nutrition interventions can build on women’s economic empowerment to contribute
to both increased income and improved household nutrition.
Job Summary: The
Business Development Officer is responsible for building the business and
commercial capacity of a wide range of stakeholders engaged in the L4L project.
These stakeholders will include, amongst others, agrovets, community animal
health workers (CAHWs), goat breeding associations, marketing associations and
VSLAs. The Business Development Officer will also be responsible for capacity
building the wider field team on market-based approaches to development and
business development, as well as ensuring best practices in these areas are integrated
into all field activities. In addition, the Business Development Officer will
contribute to Monitoring, Evaluation & Learning (MEL) activities,
particularly with regards to developing and disseminating record keeping tools
for the different stakeholders engaged in business-focused activities. The Business
Development Officer will be based in our field office in Moroto, Karamoja, and
will report to the Project Coordinator.
Key Duties and Responsibilities:  
Delivery of markets and
business-focused activities to a wider range of stakeholders in line with L4L
project implementation plan:
  • Ensure
    that business development-related project activities are implemented and
    outputs achieved as planned and within the agreed budget including:
  • Facilitating
    business development training to agrovets and vets through Farm Africa’s
    Sidai Academy
  • Training
    agrovets to deliver training on private veterinary service provision and
    supporting dissemination to CAHWs    
  • Delivery
    of BDS and logistics training to agrovets
  • Providing
    BDS training to buck keepers and supporting the establishment of private
    sector buck breeding services
  • Supporting
    the establishment of district-level community-led commercial goat breeding
    associations and delivery of business development training to them
  • Delivery
    of business development training to Goat Breeders Associations (GBA)
  • Supporting
    the establishment of marketing associations and delivery of business
    development training to them
  • Delivery
    of business development and good governance training to VSLAs
  • Ensure
    that Farm Africa Approaches to business development, access to finance and
    trade facilitation are used to guide high-quality delivery
  • Ensure
    that business development and markets focused activities are aligned with,
    and mutually supportive of other interventions in the same areas
  • Work
    with the Project Coordinator (PC) and the Project Accountant and
    Administrator (PA&A) to ensure all activities are planned and
    conducted according to the organization and the donor financial and
    procurement requirements and procedures.
Support project management and
coordination
  • Support
    the PC & PA&A with activity planning and budgeting as requested
  • Keep
    abreast of business development activities being implemented by other
    partners operating in a similar intervention area and sharing this
    information with the PC and wider team as appropriate
  • Proactively
    identify and monitor any risks to non-delivery and, where required,
    develop and implement action plans to address issues identified.
  • Support
    the PC to identify and analyze the causes of spend variances to the budget
    and make recommendations on actions to be taken as required
Monitoring, evaluation and
reporting
  • Contribute
    to internal and external reporting, with a particular focus on collecting
    and collating information from enterprises and VSLAs supported by the
    project
  • Regularly
    report on implementation learnings, and make recommendations on areas for
    improvement or changes in delivery strategy to the PC
  • Contribute
    to the development and implementation of the Monitoring, Evaluation &
    Learning Plan (MLP) – and in particular support with developing data
    collection tools that will gather relevant data from the different
    enterprises engaged in the project.
  • Contribute
    to quarterly internal progress reviews and annual project performance
    reviews and workshops
  • Collect
    information for stories, case studies and lessons learnt on market
    linkages and business development
Play a key role in delivering
the wider objectives of both the L4L programme, and Farm Africa’s work in
Uganda.
  • Participate
    in project team meetings as requested by the Project Coordinator.
  • Work
    with AFRII (implementing partner) to ensure collaboration between delivery
    of nutrition-focused and business development activities
  • Support
    the wider L4L Uganda project delivery team to integrate market approaches
    within work plans and stakeholder engagements.
  • Work
    in close collaboration with the BDO L4L Ethiopia Team – ensuring that
    knowledge, learnings and tools are shared across the two project locations
  • Maintain
    regular and effective communications with the wider project team, Uganda
    Country Office and implementing partners.
  • Work
    in close consultation with the PC, act as an ambassador, promoting the
    project and the work of Farm Africa, including hosting visitors, speaking
    at workshops, conferences and meeting donors and other officials as and
    when required.
  • Contribute
    to the development of relevant Farm Africa policies and strategies.

Qualifications, Skills and Experience: 
  • The
    ideal candidate for the Farm Africa Business Development Officer job
    placement must hold a Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent in a relevant field,
    such as agricultural economics, rural development, business or economics
  • Knowledge
    of the pastoralist, livestock and veterinary services sectors in Uganda
  • Further
    relevant academic qualification
  • in
    the area of agricultural economics, rural development, business or
    economics
  • Detailed
    understanding of participatory community-based project approaches, gender
    mainstreaming in development and economic opportunities. 
  • At
    least three years’ experience working for an INGO or agri-business
  • Experience
    of working within the livestock value chain and/or with veterinary service
    providers.
  • Experience
    of conducting market assessments
  • Experience
    of supporting the growth of businesses within the agriculture or livestock
    sectors
  • Experience
    of planning and delivering project activities and reporting on their
    impact
  • Experience
    of designing or delivering interventions that specifically encourage or
    maximise the participation of women
  • Experience
    working with pastoralist communities
  • Experience
    of working in Karamoja 
  • Experience
    of conducting market assessments focusing on the livestock value chain
    and/or veterinary drugs and services
  • Experience
    in designing and conducting business development trainings for
    micro-enterprises or SMEs
  • Experience
    of developing record keeping tools for micro/small enterprises
  • Experience
    of delivering activities focusing on the economic empowerment of rural
    women
  • Experience
    of supporting the development and growth of VSLAs
  • Ability
    to build strong relationships with stakeholders and communities based on
    trust and collaboration
  • Ability
    to communicate and share knowledge with a broad range of stakeholders with
    differing backgrounds and abilities.
  • Problem
    identification, analysis and solving of complex issues
  • Desirable
  • Multi
    stakeholder facilitation skills
  • Ability
    to influence others in order to drive change
  • Fluent
    written and spoken English
  • Ability
    and willingness to travel widely and frequently both within and outside
    the Karamoja sub-region
  • Confident
    user of Word, Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint
  • Willingness
    to ride a motorcycle in the field, with a valid riding permit (Class A)
  • Fluency
    in Karamojong is desirable
How to Apply:
All suitably qualified and
interested candidates should send an updated CV, salary history, and a two-page
supporting statement detailing how you meet the person specification to
ugandarecruitment@farmafrica.org including ‘Business Development Officer – L4L’
 in the subject line.
NB: Please DO NOT send
additional documents such as certificates and references with your application.
Shortlisted candidates ONLY will be required to provide these documents during
the interview process.  Interviews are expected to take place w/c 7th
May 2018 in Moroto (or via Skype). Only shortlisted candidates will be
contacted.
Deadline: 2nd May 2018 by 5.00pm EAT
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