About the Organization: The International Maize and Wheat Improvement
Center, known by its Spanish acronym, CIMMYT® (www.cimmyt.org), is a
not-for-profit research and training organization with partners in over 100
countries, and through offices in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
We participate in an extensive global
network of people and organizations who share similar research and development
goals, including the public and private sector, non-governmental and civil
society organizations, farmers, and the development assistance community.
Vacancy: Seed Systems Officer - DTMASS (CIMMYT)
The Position: Under the CIMMYT DTMASS (Drought-Tolerant Maize for
Africa Seed Scaling) Project, the incumbent will be responsible for providing
timely and high-quality technical assistance to in-country maize seed
production partners (private / public seed companies, NARS,NGOs) to ensure that
the project achieves project outputs and outcome targets.
This will include promotion of best
practices for DTM (Drought-Tolerant Maize) variety production (from breeding to
post-certification mass production) to engender independent and sustainable
local early-generation and Certified DTM seed production and ultimately.
Key Responsibilities:
- Under the direction of the Principle
Investigator for Kenya, implement technical support and capacity building
efforts to in-country seed companies (public and private) on DTM seed
production
- Assist multiplying initial pre-basic and basic
seed to help private seed companies to quickly scale seed production of
drought-tolerant maize varieties.
- Assist and coordinate the production of Early
Generation seed to meet the demands by private seed companies and other
partners.
- Provide technical support for the production
of certified by seed companies and distribution in the target zones.
- Support other seed system specialists and
scientists in engaging seed producers for the development of sustainable
seed networks and markets.
- Assist in developing and improving capacity of
seed sector partners through training and other related capacity-building
initiatives.
- Assist and monitor variety demonstrations
conducted by seed companies and NGOs to promote drought-tolerant maize
varieties.
- Ensure with the relevant bodies, the partner
compliance with all relevant seed quality and production and storage
standards as needed.
- Support seed company partners in timely and
accurate recording of seed production Progress Reports, including the
reporting of any challenges.
Essential Qualifications
- MSc in Agriculture or related field.
- Minimum 3-5 years of relevant experience in
maize seed production, maize breeding, agronomy or related field.
- Experience working with public and private
seed sectors (NARES, private seed companies, extension workers, etc.)
- Experience organizing and implementing Variety
demonstrations, field days, other promotion activities.
- Experience in collecting DUS and VCU data.
- Experience in training or skills transfer.
Terms of offer: CIMMYT in Kenya is hosted by the World Agroforestry
Centre (ICRAF) which is an equal opportunity employer and offers a collegial
and gender-sensitive working environment.
We believe that staff diversity
promotes excellence and strongly encourage applications from qualified
women.
This position is on local terms and
subject to ICRAF HR policies and will be for an initial period of two (2)
years, subject to six (6) months’ probation period with a possibility of
renewal.
The position will be based in the CIMMYT office in Nairobi, Kenya but will require travel to the field inside the country, with a possibility of occasional travel abroad.
Vacancy: Monitoring & Evaluation and Learning Officer - CIMMYT
The Position: The incumbent will provide timely and high-quality
data collection, analysis and reporting of in-country maize seed production and
promotion efforts under the six-country CIMMYT DTMASS (Drought-Tolerant Maize
for Africa Seed Scaling) Project based in Nairobi.
Key Responsibilities:
- Implement a monitoring, evaluation and
learning (ME&L) framework in-country under the direction of the Senior
ME&L Specialist
- Support Project partners (local seed companies
and quality control agencies) set up regular data collection systems to
record Project indicators and maintain quality assurance of their data
- Ensure data compliance with CIMMYT and donor
(USAID) indicator requirements, including measuring Gender issues
- Ensure complete, quality and timely data and
reporting of partner and Project data to the Senior Project ME&L
Specialist
- Support the Project with knowledge management
(analysis, reporting and feedback mechanisms) of Project progress,
successes and challenges
- Build the ME&L capacity of in-country
partners, providing technical assistance as needed and participating in
Project capacity building workshops when required
- Support in-country research and other data
collection efforts as needed (securing and training enumerators; etc.)
- Support SR ME&L Specialist and CIMMYT SEP
staff in design and testing of data collection instruments including: Surveys;
Key Informant Interviews; Focus Group discussions; Observation;
self-assessment surveys; etc.
- Help find and summarize in-country secondary
data on the maize seed sector as needed/ directed by the Senior ME&L
Specialist
- Support CIMMYT Communications staff in
preparing materials for publication on DTMASS efforts and project success
stories.
Essential Qualifications
- Preferably Masters Degree in International
Development, Agricultural Economics, Business or related field; Bachelors
degree with outstanding experience may be considered.
- Expertise in M&E, data collection,
indicator design, analysis strategies; field research design
- Enumerator training skills.
- Minimum 5-7 years’ experience in development
program M&E
- Experience with field data collection and
quality control• Experience recruiting, training and managing data
enumerators
- Experience designing and field testing
indicators and survey instruments
- Experience with USAID projects a big plus; UN,
WB Gates and other major international donor project experience highly
desired
Terms of offer: CIMMYT in Kenya is hosted by the World Agroforestry
Centre (ICRAF) which is an equal opportunity employer and offers a collegial
and gender-sensitive working environment.
We believe that staff diversity
promotes excellence and strongly encourage applications from qualified
women.
This position is on local terms and
subject to ICRAF HR policies and will be for an initial period of two (2)
years, subject to six (6) months’ probation period with a possibility of renewal.
The position will be based in the
CIMMYT office in Nairobi, Kenya but will require travel to the field inside the
country with a possibility of occasional travel abroad.
How to apply
Applications will be considered until 6th November 2015.
Please note that only short-listed applicants meeting the above requirements will be contacted.
We invite you to learn more about CIMMYT and World Agroforestry Centre by accessing our web sites www.cimmyt.org and www.worldagroforestry.org