Research Officer II at ILRI Ethiopia

•  11 Apr 2022
•  Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
•  Full-time
•  The Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT

The Position: The Alliance of Bioversity International – CIAT seeks to recruit a Research Officer II who be a member of the Alliance which is based at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) campus in Addis Ababa. The specific research focus of the Research Officer II position is to develop analytics to guide effective targeting of a suite of Climate Agricultural Risk Management (Clim-ARM) and Weather Climate Service (WCS) interventions and develop investment blueprints. Co-lead in managing and implementing project activities; and achieving creative partnerships across public and private sectors to strengthen the climate and agriculture risk management decision support tools to aid the agriculture sector. Research Officer II who will be responsible for leading rigorous climate service, weather, and climate risk assessment alongside agricultural risk management for the Climate Action Lever in Ethiopia. He/She will be responsible to execute the climate and agricultural risk assessment, and comprehensive inventory of all known ARM tools, best practices, drivers, and barriers to adoption in Ethiopia. He/she will also be required to work very closely with other scientists within the Lever under the leadership of the Research Team Leader. The desired candidate is innovative, dynamic professional able to work independently with minimal supervision, but also participate as a team member in accomplishment of duties. 

General: The Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) delivers research-based solutions that address the global crises of malnutrition, climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental degradation. The Alliance focuses on the nexus of agriculture, nutrition and environment. We work with local, national, and multinational partners across Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and with the public and private sectors and civil society. With novel partnerships, the Alliance generates evidence and mainstreams innovations to transform food systems and landscapes so that they sustain the planet, drive prosperity, and nourish people. The Alliance is organized into six key levers: 1)Food environment and consumer behavior - reshaping the food environment and consumer behavior toward healthy and sustainable diets; 2) Multifunctional landscapes - fostering innovation for environmental health and productive landscapes to improve livelihoods; 3) Climate action - mainstreaming climate action in the food system to reduce risks; 4) Biodiversity for food and agriculture - making agricultural and tree diversity available and safeguarding it for the diverse needs of food system actors; 5) Digital inclusion - promoting inclusion in the digital agriculture revolution for equitable benefits; and 6) Crops for nutrition and health - putting nutrition and health at the heart of crop improvement to address the triple burden of malnutrition. The job will provide support to the Climate Action lever in Ethiopia though the day-to-day follow-up of project implementation on the ground, leasing with partners and researchers at federal, regional and local level, and analysis, interpretation, and presentation of scientific evidences.

Main Responsibilities:

• Applies cutting-edge data science skills to enable integration and processing of large datasets from multiple sources at various scales (global, regional, country, zones, farms, crop value chain, socio-economic, etc.);
• Coordinates and conducts rigorous weather, climate service, and climate risk assessment alongside agricultural risk management in Ethiopia with a technical guidance from the team;
• Co-leads the designing of the road-map investment blueprints for weather and climate services that will lay the groundwork for future scaling, adoption, and mainstreaming of improvements to meso- and macro-scale agricultural risk management;
• Develops and/or refines existing scripts and tools for climate data analytics that can be used by scientists to curate, analyses and visualizes their data;
• Develops and/or adapts ICT-based tools for Clim-ARM data collection including socio-economic data;
• Synthesizes and reviews technical reports for the various project;
• Liaises with national partners, and stakeholders, and work closely with team members to execute the climate and agricultural risk assessment, and comprehensive inventory of all known ARM tools, best practices, drivers, and barriers to adoption in Ethiopia;
• Develops research questions and survey instruments for continuous monitoring and assessing the climate service and tools in agri-advisory;
• Conducts statistical analysis of data collected in the field books and enters an appropriate database, to contribute data management for the project and draft technical reports and scientific publications;
• Provides technical support and build the capacity of field investigators/enumerators in collecting information related to climate service, market information;
• Contributes and leads proposal development, handles, and analyses data to produce high quality technical reports;
• Contributes to the fulfilment, in a timely and accurate fashion, of the various mandatory reporting requirements for the ongoing climate action lever activities in Ethiopia;
• Supports the dissemination of project results through available stakeholder platforms including presentations and reports;
• Writing literature review, research reports, and policy briefs; editing and/transcribing reports, manuscripts, proposals and other documents; collating and documenting of CSA research done by CIAT;
• Organizing seminars, workshops and other learning or/ stakeholder consultative events; Establishes and maintains contacts with CSA stakeholders in government, civil society, private sector and research;
• Any other responsibilities that will be assigned by supervisor.

Minimum Requirements:

Education:

• Masters’ degree in in Food security, Sustainable Agriculture, Rural development, Climate Change, Developmental Economics, Information management, or a related field with professional certification

Experience:

• A minimum of five years of relevant work experience in the field of agriculture, climate, food security, sustainable agriculture, or related fields.

Skills:

• Practical experience in climate, agricultural risk management, decision support tool for resilience and risk reduction, food security analysis, early warning and analysis;
• Knowledge and experience with use of agricultural risk management tools for development, policy, and research;
• Proven experience in analytical and problem solving, digital technology, database management and manipulation;
• Knowledge of the Ethiopian agriculture and livestock industries with good research experience;
• Thorough knowledge of SPSS, word processing, spreadsheet, and data management including Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint and Access;
• Good understanding of Ethiopia’s agro-advisory systems, farming systems, markets, value chains, and agriculture;
• Strong communication, writing and presentation skills in English and knowledge of local languages;

Duty Station:    Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Position level:  HG 14

Minimum Base salary:                

• Birr 41,571 per month (Negotiable depending on salary history of the candidate)

Terms of appointment: Initial appointment is for one year renewable appointment based on performance and funding availability. CIAT offers a multicultural, collegial research environment with competitive salary and excellent benefits in line with ILRI salary applicable for its Nationally Recruited Staff. CIAT is an international and equal opportunity organization and believes that diversity of its staff contributes to excellence. The ILRI campus is set in a secure, attractive campus with dining and sports facilities.

Applications: Applicants should provide a cover letter and curriculum vitae; names and addresses (including telephone and email) of three referees who are knowledgeable about the candidate’s professional qualifications and work experience to be included in the curriculum vitae. The position and reference number: C/RO/04/22 should be clearly indicated in the subject line of the cover letter. All applications to be submitted online on our recruitment portal: CLICK HERE on or before 11 April 2022.

To find more about CIAT, visit our Website at http://www.ciat.cgiar.org

Suitably qualified women are particularly encouraged to apply.