Programme Assistant - Gender and Climate Smart Agriculture

Contract

This is a UNV National Specialist contract. This kind of contract is known as National UN Volunteer. It is normally only for nationals. More about UNV National Specialist contracts.

Given that agricultural production remains the main source of income for most rural communities, the increased risk of crop and livestock production failure, associated with increased frequency of extreme climate events, poses a major threat to food security and poverty reduction. Adaptation of the agricultural sector to the adverse effects of climate change is thus an important priority, to protect and improve the livelihoods of the poor and to ensure food security. With little resilience to climatic changes, economic and social shocks, smallholder farmers in arid and semi arid (ASAL) counties have become extremely vulnerable to food insecurity. Further, climate change increases the uncertainty as most of the households are unaware of the fast-changing environment.

Considering that the agricultural sector is populated with many actors supporting the promotion of climate resilience agriculture (CRA) in the country, most interventions have challenges reaching out to the most vulnerable including women as they are not informed by gender analysis and lack specific gender interventions. This project complements and strengthens these efforts by placing an emphasis on promoting gender-sensitive CSA solutions in the country. The project intends to ensure that it reaches the rural women thereby inherently strengthening the adaptive capacities of vulnerable groups of people in the community to climate change and variability.

UN Women Kenya under its Women Economic Empowerment Unit will be implementing a four year Project dubbed, “Women Empowerment through Climate Smart Agriculture Project in Laikipia, Kitui and West Pokot Counties”, supported by the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA).

The overall goal is to enhance gender-sensitive adaptive capacity of selected ASAL counties to climate change and strengthen women’s capacity to meaningfully engage in climate smart agriculture.

The Programme Assistant (National UNV) will work closely with national partners, both governmental and civil society together with UN Women programme and operations staff, involved in formulating and implementing UN WOMEN initiatives around Climate Smart Agriculture. The Programme Assistant will in close collaboration with UN Women programme, operations and projects’ staff in the Country Office resolve complex programme and operations-related issues as well as to ensure proper exchange of respective information. Likewise, he/she will collaborate with FAO and other UN agencies’ programme and operations staff as required.

Under the overall guidance of the Team Leader-Women Economic Empowerment, the Programme Assistant shall be responsible for field level implementation of the project in West Pokot county.

A. Programme Management Support - Provide programme and administrative support to the CSA programme in the preparation of programme work plans, budgets, and proposals on programme implementation arrangements; - Lead the implementation of field project activities in Kitui, Laikipia or West Pokot county as per the approved workplans; - Provide technical support in the implementation of Programme activities at county level; - Provide substantive inputs to the preparation of UN Women internal reports and KOICA narrative and financial donor reports; - Review and monitor the submission of implementing partner financial and narrative reports; - Provide support in monitoring and evaluation of the projects on reporting guidelines and procedures as per UN Women’s rules and regulations; - Undertake field visits to monitor performance of commitments by implementing partners and ensure programme objectives are being met.

B. Administrative Support to the CSA Project - Provide administration/procurement support to the project: organization of conferences, workshops, seminars, missions, budget the events; - Make travel arrangements as necessary including preparation of travel requisitions and claim; - Organize and coordinate filing of correspondence/documents and ensure up-to- date filing. Maintain both hard copies and electronic copies of the office records and reference files on various subjects; - Create and maintain appropriate folders for reference materials received electronically; - Prepare presentation material/slides in PowerPoint for presentations for the meetings/workshops and keep all papers ready for meetings.

C. Technical and Advisroy Support - Supervise closely, the KOICA implementing CSO’s activities; - Maintain relationships with county partners to support implementation of the climate smart agriculture programme; - Identify opportunities for capacity building of partners and together with KCO, facilitate technical/ programming support and trainings including in M&E and Results Based Management, to partners, as needed; - Provide technical assistance, mentoring, training and capacity development initiatives to partners at grassroots and county level.

D. Provide Substantive Inputs to Building Partnerships and Resource Mobilization Strategies - Forge strategic partnerships and maintain relationships with county partners to support implementation of the CSA project; - Lead UN Women’s participation in policy dialogues at county level, on issues related to the Gender Responsive Climate Smart Agriculture Programme as necessary; - Prepare relevant documentation such as project summaries, conference papers, briefing notes, speeches, and donor profiles; - Participate in donor meetings and public information events, as delegated.

E. Provide substantive inputs to advocacy, knowledge building and communication efforts - Organize advocacy campaigns at county and grassroots level, events, trainings, workshops, and knowledge products; - Identify best practices and lessons learned to guide programme improvement and strategy planning; - Contribute to develop knowledge management strategies, products, and methodologies on the Gender Responsive Climate Smart Agriculture programme; - Participate in KOICA donor meetings and public information events, as delegated.

Furthermore, UN Volunteers are required to: - Strengthen their knowledge and understanding of the concept of volunteerism by reading relevant UNV and external publications and take active part in UNV activities (for instance in events that mark IVD); - Be acquainted with and build on traditional and/or local forms of volunteerism in the host country; - Reflect on the type and quality of voluntary action that they are undertaking, including participation in ongoing reflection activities; - Contribute articles/write-ups on field experiences and submit them for UNV publications/websites, newsletters, press releases, etc.; - Assist with the UNV Buddy Programme for newly-arrived UN Volunteers; - Promote or advise local groups in the use of online volunteering, or encourage relevant local individuals and organizations to use the UNV Online Volunteering service whenever technically possible.

Timely programmatic support to the Women Economic Empowerment Unit

project management for development projects- implementation, coordination, monitoring and evaluation, donor reporting and capacity building at the community or national level - Experience in the Climate Smart Agriculture and gender is an asset - Experience coordinating and liaising with government agencies and civil society - Ability to relocate to the counties - Excellent computing and IT skills, with full competency of office software packages

The Republic of Kenya is an equatorial nation on the coast of East Africa, neighboring Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan, Uganda, Tanzania, and the Indian Ocean. Kenya has two levels of Government; National Government and 47 sub-national Governments called Counties. Counties are further divided into sub-counties. Kenya is a multi-party state with Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches. Kenya’s population of more than 40 million is growing at an annual rate of 2.2%. The country’s GNP per capita estimated at purchasing power parity (PPP) is $975, and the GNP is growing at an average rate of 0.1% annually. More than 26% of Kenya’s people live below the international poverty line of $1 per day. Kenya’s main food crops are “maize, wheat, pulses, roots and tubers.” (FAO).