Catholic Relief Services (CRS) is an international non-governmental organization supporting relief and development work in over 99 countries around the world. CRS programs assist persons on the basis of need, regardless of creed, ethnicity or nationality.

CRS has operated in Ghana for over 50 years (since 1958), delivering essential support and help to the needy in agriculture, water and sanitation, education, emergency response, health, HIV & AIDS, microfinance, and peace building. CRS works through local church and non-church partners to implement its programs. Therefore, strengthening and building the capacity of these partner organizations is fundamental to our approach in every country in which CRS operates.

Job Title: Senior Program Officer – Agriculture (SPO-Agric)
Department: Programming
Unit: Agriculture
Reports to: Program Manager – Agriculture
Location: Tamale, Ghana

ABOUT CRS
CRS-Ghana programming in agriculture and rural livelihoods currently focuses on increasing household and community resiliency as well as equitable access to markets. As much as possible, programming is integrated with the other sectors, in particular health, microfinance and emergency response.

The approach supports efficient use of human resources, but more importantly, has ensured a holistic understanding of agriculture and community development issues as well as delivery of sustainable development options for farming communities

PURPOSE
CRS-Ghana is seeking a Senior Program Officer – Agric (SPO – Agric) to assist with the country program’s agriculture and livelihoods initiatives, project implementation and current and future program planning. The SPO-Agric will be responsible for ensuring efficient running of projects, liaise with project partners and lead on sustainability strategies for projects.

The projects’ summary is as follows:
Soybean Innovation Labs Project (SIL): This project aims at establishing the foundation for soybeans in Africa. The approach is based on five pillars that comprise the essential components of sustained production, improved household nutrition and sustainable market linkages for soybean farmers focusing on (I) Genetic Improvement, (II) Enhanced Crop Productivity and Quality, (III) Value Chains and Local Processing, (IV) Nutrition, and (V) Socio-Economic Research with a novel SMART Farm concept (Soybean Management with Appropriate Research and Technology) as its platform. CRS Ghana is tasked with providing support to pillar five, the socio-economic research, and also to pilot SILC in some of the villages that will benefit from the intervention.

Long Term Sweet Potato Storage Project:
The goal is to improve the nutritional and commercial benefits of sweetpotato for smallholder farmers in Africa by breaking bottlenecks in long term storage thereby reducing postharvest losses.

Yam Improvement for Incomes & Food Security in West Africa (YIIFSWA):
CRS Ghana is leading the implementation of the projects’ 3rd objective to halt the decline and double the productivity of yams stimulating a sustainable increase in incomes for smallholders and in addition, contribute to their food security. Training, handholding and demonstration to knowledge and technical skills to produce clean healthy planting material (seed yam) is the primary tool used to achieve success.

Farmbook Toolkit for Extension Agents (Farmbook TEA):
This project uses Farmbook, a software platform designed by designed and owned by the agency as a business planning tool to support the work in value chains for vulnerable farmers. CRS trains extension agents on it use and application to enable them assist farmers with tools and information needed to make profit whilst transforming the conventional way of thinking form being subsistent into being business entrepreneurs

The SPO-Agric will report to the Agriculture Program Manager and will commit to adhering to CRS technical and program quality standards in implementation and the timely submission of all required deliverables to all donors.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES
Project Coordination:

•   Ensure that objectives and goals for the projects are in line with CRS agency and country program strategies as well as Ministry of Food and Agriculture strategies.
•   Coordinate all project activities related to the SIL, Sweet Potato, YIIFSWA, Farmbook projects and all others that will be implemented

Business Development:

•   Assist PM with technical proposal development.
•   Support the development of and implementation of a program growth strategy with CRS-Ghana staff and implementing partners.
•   In collaboration with PM, develop relationships with key donors with the view to understanding the priorities and opportunities of each organization.

Representation & Program Quality:

•   Represent the PM and the country program at sector meetings, conferences and workshops
•   Act as primary contact to local and international stakeholders in agriculture in the absence of PM and in consultation with HoP
•   Lead the incorporation of M&E and Learning into program plans
•   Assist PM in ensuring unit’s strategic objectives are fully accomplished

Specified Duties/Responsibilities on Individual Projects

SIL Project

Planning/Training Stage

•   Assist with demographic/economic data collection in villages
•   Secure consent from local village leaders for data collection to take place
•   Assist with Developing survey implementation plan
•   Plan field work logistics for enumerators
•   Assist with Developing training materials for survey enumerators with PIs
•   Assist with survey questionnaire editing
•   Test surveys on tablets at CRS offices and in the field
•   Lead the training of survey enumerators
•   Ensure that all enumerators complete Human Subject Training

Survey Implementation Stage

•   Coordinate the interviewer activities
•   Conduct surveys
•   Ensure high quality enumeration from the enumerators
•   Troubleshoot problems in the field
•   Ensure that all data is properly uploaded to the secure servers from the field
•   Ensure that all data is also stored securely at CRS offices and maintain backups of the dataset
•   Maintain and track the survey equipment

Data Processing Stage

•   Be available to answer questions that arise during data processing
•   Identify weak points discovered in the previous wave of the survey

Throughout the Project

•   Maintain strong relationships with village contact-persons
•   Help identify new avenues for funding and future research
•   Maintain secure files containing project-related documents
•   Replace enumeration staff that are not fulfilling their responsibilities

Sweet Potato Storage Project

•   Monitoring of household experiments of beneficiaries
•   Maintain close relationship with UDS, MoFA, CIP partners
•   Develop strategy to build trust with beneficiaries
•   Review Activity reports submitted by MoFA
•   Act as main liaison with partners
•   Oversee efficient implementation of project

YIIFSWA Project

•   Assist PM with all aspects of project roll-out
•   Liaise with MoFA, CRI, SARI, UDS, KNUST partners constantly
•   Supervise training sessions and field day demonstrations
•   Assist PM with timely delivery of bi-annual reports to IITA
•   Attend meetings / workshops / trainings with PM

FARMBOOK TEA Project

•   Assist PM with the development of training plans and schedules
•   Coordinate training logistics and meetings
•   Lead the monitoring and evaluation of project activities
•   Responsible for activity reports to CWA

KEY WORKING RELATIONSHIPS

•   Internal: Agriculture PM and other line Managers, Nutrition Specialist, SILC Specialist M&E Specialist, and other Field Officers
•   External: District and Regional Agricultural Development Units in implementing districts, Research Institutions (CRI, ARI, SARI), Advocacy Platforms (ASWG & NASWG); Program Coordination Bodies (SADA)

Qualification Required & Experience

•   Master’s Degree or equivalent in Agriculture, Agribusiness, Agriculture Economics or related field
•   Professional experience not less than 3 years in the area of Community Development, Agronomy, Microfinance, Farm Level Handholding and FBO capacity development
•   Experience in donor funded project coordination using participatory approaches to providing support to partners and training of beneficiaries
•   Experience in management of programmatic and statistical data and M&E
•   Knowledge of and experience with smallholder agricultural value chains
•   Flexibility; ability to work as a team in a multicultural context
•   Excellent communication and inter-personal skills
•   Computer skills in MS Word, Excel, Access, STATA, PowerPoint, SPSS

PERSONAL SKILLS

•   Experience in training and providing technical support to partners/community-based agents
•   Strong work ethics and team building skills
•   Excellent human relations and enthusiasm for new challenges
•   Good networking skills and professionalism

Competencies

•   Set clear goals and  work  towards achieving them
•   Collaborates effectively with staff and stakeholders
•   Manages financial resources with integrity
•   Applies program quality standards to project design and organizational learning

Agency-Wide Competencies

•   Upholds a Spirit of Service and Integrity
•   Cultivates Constructive and Collegial Relationships
•   Models Principled Stewardship
•   Promotes continuous learning and innovation

Location: Accra

How To Apply For The Job

To apply for this position, please submit your CV and letter of interest to:

GH_jobs@global.crs.org

Closing Date: 25 February, 2014

Application must be saved with this format:- Application.CV.(Name). Senior Program Officer – Agric

•   CRS is an equal opportunity employer.
•   Female candidates meeting position requirements are strongly encouraged to apply Deadline for application.