Senior Partnership and Resource Mobilization Officer NEW

• Vacancy Announcement
• ETHIOPIAN AGRICULTURAL TRANSFORMATION INSTITUTE
• Position:  Senior Partnership and Resource Mobilization Officer
• Term of Employment:   One year with a possibility of extension
• Duty Station(s):    Addis Ababa, Ethiopia                    
• Required Number:  One
• Application Deadline:      November 30,2024

Background

The Ethiopian Agricultural Transformation Institute (ATI), formerly known as the Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA), is a strategy and delivery-oriented government institute created to help accelerate the growth and transformation of Ethiopia’s agriculture sector, which is a key contributor to the country’s GDP, exports, and workforce. The ATI’s work is centered on improving the livelihoods of smallholder farmers (SHFs) across the country for improved income, inclusiveness, resilience, and sustainability.

The ATI works to transform the agriculture sector in Ethiopia by conducting policy and analytical studies, providing technical implementation support and capacity building, coordinating.

platforms to better integrate partners and projects and designing and directly leading several innovative/pilot interventions.

The Institute joins forces with various stakeholders, including policymakers, researchers, farmers, and development partners, to support the implementation of agricultural development programs and initiatives. In addition, the ATI collaborates with national and international partners to facilitate knowledge exchange and learning opportunities. The Institute plays a crucial role in generating and disseminating information to support evidence-based decision-making in Ethiopia’s agricultural sector.

Our Culture 

We have an exceptional team of highly competent employees with a proven track record of success in managing complex activities and achieving transformational results.  Our culture is one where talented, dedicated, and adaptable individuals are committed to doing their best and exhibit great team work to achieve excellent results.

At ATI, we provide an exceptional platform for people who want to achieve their highest potential and make a meaningful contribution in changing the country’s agricultural sector.  We offer rewarding work in a young, fast-paced growing organization with passionate, committed, motivated colleagues and excellent career development and training.  We recognize our most valuable assets are our staff and are committed to providing our employees with the tools, training, and mentorships necessary to achieve their career goals.

Program and Position Summary

The Ethiopian Agricultural Transformation Institute (ATI) has designed a program called “Agriculture-focused Dignified Employment for Youth in Ethiopia” (ADEY) to address youth and women unemployment and increase the participation of young people in the labor market, particularly in the agriculture sector. ATI has mainstreamed youth employment, gender equality, climate-smart, and nutrition-sensitive agriculture in all its programs and projects with the primary objectives of increasing access to sustainable and inclusive job opportunities for youth, inclusivity, and the sustainable use of natural resources while building resilience capacities to shocks at all levels.

ATI, among others, currently works with more than 3 million smallholder farmers (540,300 are women and youth) engaged in the Agricultural Commercialization Clusters (ACC) and digital agriculture programs designed to improve production and productivity while supporting other actors along the value chain. Taking ATI’s reputable experiences, the ADEY program is designed to create inclusive and dignified work opportunities for over six hundred thousand youth. Livestock is one of the major pillars of ACC initiatives identified for the ADEY program based on its potential and job creation opportunities. The major intervention areas of the ADEY program are: enhance skills and mindsets of young women and men through technical and business skill development; increase access to agricultural inputs for production and marketing enterprises; introduce youth-friendly and cost-effective agricultural production practices and technologies; establish young people owned micro, small and medium agro-processing and value addition enterprises; increased access to inclusive financial products tailored to the needs of young people; enhance access to market tailored to the needs and capacities of young people and create an

The Senior Partnership and Resource Mobilization Officer is responsible for managing resource allocations, partnership initiation, engagement & management, monitoring & evaluation and performance reporting of the ADSEY program. As part of the ATI’s partnership and resource mobilization team, he/she will also be responsible to support and provide advice to other internal programs and partners on a range of resource mobilization and partnership initiatives. The position holder will closely work with the Grant Management team to ensure compliance of ATI’s policies, development partners’ requirements, and government’s laws on grant management. He/she will directly report to the Director for the Partnerships and to the ADEY Program Director in a matrix. She/he will closely work with the ADEY and other program teams at the head office and the regions.

Major Duties and Responsibilities 

1. Partnerships Management

• Coordinate and maintain relations with the Mastercard Foundation and other donors and ensure they are consistently and timely informed on important operational Issues. This includes effective communication with donors’ focal points and being the institute’s focal point for resource mobilization and sustainability activities.
• Participate in and contribute to partnerships meetings with ADEY implementing partners, donors and other agencies/programs to develop and seek new partnership opportunities.
• Lead partners’ outreaching activities (identification of contact points, preparation and set up of meetings, conference calls and/or missions) to build relationship with funding partners.
• Facilitate the development of a Resource Mobilization Strategy that includes securing new, diverse, and additional resources for the organization, in respond to the institute’s funding needs.
• Carry out research and map potential funding partners (e.g. bi/multi-lateral agencies, development partners, funds, projects, foundations, etc.).
• Prepare potential funding partners’ profiles (geographic and thematic priorities/areas of interest, eligibility criteria, funding mechanisms, etc.). And review and improve existing profiles, as required.
• Conducting research on potential donors/partners. Including proactively identifying funding opportunities, scan the network and solicit donor intelligence and share information on donor profiles (policies, preferences, geographical focus, etc.)
• Identify funding opportunities (e.g. calls for proposals/proposals for grants website) proposed by potential partners and provide support for application and proposals
• Support the Directors in preparation of various supporting material for outreach activities (briefings/background papers, concept notes, PowerPoint presentations, etc.)
• Contribute to development of Resource Mobilization Manual that includes standard operating procedures and processes; and define the direction of resource acquisition and utilization, approvals and follow up.
• Draft proposals and concepts to diverse sources, including development partners, donors, etc.
• Produce resource mobilization plans and reports as per stipulated periods and requirements to the Director of the partnerships team and the SMT as required.

   

1. Grant Allocation and Management

• Together with the Grant Management and Resource Allocation team, oversee the administration, monitoring of funds as well as their disbursement, so as to ensure organizational compliance with the donors’ programmatic and financial reporting requirements by promoting the effective and efficient use of mobilized donor resources.
• Make sure that grants are allocated to allowable and allocable program/project components and activities and respective donor and government budget lines during planning and budget preparation.
• Provide internal stakeholders with technical advice and information on development partner funding priorities to strengthen opportunities for target fundraising and facilitate the coordination and collaboration between project teams and donors/development partners.
• Organize quarterly review meetings with Budget Holders, Finance, Procurement, Logistics and Sub-grant teams in facilitating periodic grant update meetings and ensure that the action points arising from these meetings on grant are followed and implemented.
• Support the annual planning exercise of the institute and advise teams in planning activities and budget in line with donor requirements and available fund.
• Ensuring adherence and Donor Compliance requirements both at the ATI and implementing partners in respect of financial and budget management.
• Ensure that all grants are complete and accurate from a donors’ requirement and compliance perspective in advance of grant closure.
• Conduct consistent monitoring and evaluation activities of Donor-funded activities in order to prepare progress reports.

1. Reporting

• Make sure donors reports are in line with donor requirements in terms of timeline, template, approved programmatic component/activity, and budget line.
• Work closely with ADEY and other programs’ budget holders and implementing partners for ensuring a quality justification for activities that are not aligned with donor agreed activities.
• Work closely with the Resource Allocation Officer, Finance, Sub-grant and Program teams, to ensure the consolidation of financial reports with respective narrative reports before final submission to donors.
• Support the Senior Management Team, Leadership, the Partnerships and program directors, and others to enhance staff awareness and competencies regarding partnerships and donor compliance/requirements to improve reporting qualities.