POSITION/DESIGNATION: Field Officer (FO) -Agriculture and Water Structure
GRADE/LEVEL: Grade G
PROJECT/UNIT: More Secure and Resilient Lives and Livelihood for Rural Poor Households
PROJECT DURATION: Three years (Till 31st March 2023)
(1 Year renewable contract based on performance and organizational need analysis)
REPORTS TO: Project Manager
LOCATION: Patan Block, District Durg, Chattisgarh
TRAVEL: 80% including daily field travel, district head quarter, state and national travel as required.
ABOUT US:
CARE is a not-for-profit organization working in India for over 68 years, focusing on alleviating poverty and social injustice. We do this through well-planned and comprehensive projects in health, education, livelihoods and disaster preparedness and response. Our overall goal is the empowerment of women and girls from poor and marginalized communities leading to improvement in their lives and livelihoods.
During FY 2018-19, CARE India directly reached out to 37.2 million people through 43 projects across 14 states, covering more than 80+ districts. We are part of the CARE International Confederation, working in 100 countries for a world where people live with dignity and security.
CARE India seeks a world of hope, tolerance and social justice, where poverty has been overcome and people live in dignity and security.
Our goal is to ensure that women and girls from the most marginalized communities are empowered, live in dignity and their households have secure and resilient lives. CARE India aims to accomplish this goal by working with 50 million people to help them have quality health, education, livelihoods and overcome the effects of disasters.
www.careindia.org | Regd. as CARE India Solutions for Sustainable Development
PROJECT DETAILS:
The Project proposes an initiative which addresses the underlying causes of poor smallholders’ including women’s inequitable participation and their empowerment in a sustainable crop/livestock production system contributing to the productivity.
Based on this analysis of the underlying causes of inequitable participation and low productive engagement of poor smallholders, CARE India envisions changes in four interrelated outcomes areas to be essential for achieving the goal. The four change areas are:
1. Increased adoption of improved practices in farming, livestock rearing, NRM among smallholders, especially women farmers
2. Strengthened collectives of smallholder farmers catering to their needs
3. Increased returns to smallholder producers, especially women through market linkages and participation in value chains.
4. Positive and enabling attitudes of panchayat raj institutions (PRIs), service providers and market institutions, towards the impact group.
JOB SUMMARY: Field Officer- Agriculture and Water Structure is to be primarily contracted for 34 months (may be extended as per need/ requirement) to support the project located in Patan Block, Durg District, Chhattisgarh. Field Officer- Agriculture and Water Structure is the resource person to bring in innovation, project execution and strategies to realize the vision of sustainable food systems from production of diverse foods to assist in marketing of agricultural produce supporting small and marginal landholding farmers particularly women farmer.
ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:
• He/ she will develop appropriate strategy, implementation models and intervention roadmap to promote sustainable layering of climate resilience in agricultural production systems through various water retention and efficient water usage models to ensure higher multi-crops, crop diversification and prevention of crop loss due to water shortage on farm lands and also kitchen gardens, besides supporting diverse water needs in diverse farm and livestock e.g. goattery, mushroom, poultry, etc.
• Responsible for water structure and irrigation systems design, maintenance and repairs with macro-micro projects like dug well, water sheds, drip irrigation, etc with farmers and community empowerment, training and community mobilization and also resource and labour contribution from the farmers and community.
• Create systems of community ownership and management with contribution for design creation, maintenance and repairs and also take lead in integrating resources from diverse sources like agriculture department, watershed mission, SRLM, etc and also private sectors, CSRs in the 20 village clusters under the project.
• Responsible for ensuring technical appropriateness and rigor of water stress reduction in agriculture and allied activities, ensure climate resilient agriculture production, crop diversification and multi-cropping in the area with community mobilization, participatory planning, accessing subsidized schemes, government department support, etc.
• Ensure that the target number of 20 villages and households are extended technical support strictly adhering to the SOP, continuous monitoring, leadership of Community Resource Persons (CRPs), M & E systems, timely procurement, following accounts & procurement systems, etc with planning, ownership and prior approval of project manager and Deputy Director.
• Ensure that water challenges are addressed on time to support the project with the required number of demo plots in pulses /legume /vegetable cultivation and demo sites in kitchen gardening as per the workplan are established strictly adhering to the SOPs.
• To ensure technical support to demo farmers as well as influenced farmers as and when required on water usage.
• Understand issues and problems faced in the field, aggregate and seek advice.
• from senior colleagues as per requirement.
• Producing designs, both initial outlines and full plans, timely monitoring, on-field demonstration and support to CRPs and farmers, donor reporting.
• Support to the team in designing and organizing state level events, policy discourse and representing various forums.
• Actively participate in discussion forums, workshops, seminars, write shops and other appropriate events.
• Produce papers, learning materials and bulletins from time to time for wider packaging of project & CISSD.
• Identify policy advocacy agenda under HRDP HDFC project and develop learning material and plans accordingly for ready dissemination.
• He/ she will plan, design, build capacity, support concurrent monitoring, necessitate evaluation studies and facilitate knowledge products around approaches, strategies and tools to generate demand around and secure sustainable models encompassing, sustainable production of nutrition rich food.
Other responsibilities:
• Be accountable for timely accomplishment of responsibilities under his/her thematic area line items with respect to the project DIP and Workplan and generate adequate Means of Verifications (MoVs).
• Raise purchase requests (PRs) and closure of PRs in consultation with the supervisor, for products and services deemed necessary towards undertaking prior-approved project activities with discussion and prior approval of the Project Manager and Deputy Director as per CISSD Procurement Policy and functions Provide domain related documentation such as training reports, technical assessment summary, activity cost-estimation, etc.
• Perform any other task assigned by the line manager as per organizational requirement.
DESIRED PROFILE:
• A water engineer/ agricultural engineer with multidisciplinary professional with exposure to climate resilient efficient water usage advanced agriculture systems for sustainable multi-diversified agricultural productivity at micro, small and marginal levels.
• Interested in and have proved track record in developing water retention, irrigation and climate resilient agriculture productivity models in Chhattisgarh or climate impacted state/ geography with proven impact on sustainable production of nutrient rich crops in various agro-climatic and socio-cultural situations.
• An innovator and diligent professional who accepts challenge.
• Strategic communicator with ambition towards research and knowledge.
• An inspiration leader who can motivate and mobilize community, engage with government departments and brig in resources from diverse sources including motivating community for contribution in developing community water structure and adopt to new water models.
• A leader with proven capacity towards supportive supervision and meet strict deadlines adhering to quality of deliverables.
QUALIFICATION & EXPERIENCE:
Essential:
• Master of Science in Agriculture /Diploma or B.Tech in Agriculture Engineering from reputed institution/Government agriculture university with related experience at least 5-10 year.
• OR
• Postgraduate in Rural Development with at least 5-10 years of working experience in Agriculture and Water Structure sector.
• Hands on experience in working extensively on diverse water structure design, development and implementation and working experience of directly working with farmers on the ground to support climate resilient agriculture with crop diversification and kitchen gardening.
• Experience in supporting and handholding farmers in adopting and adapting to best practices and newer climate resilient farming through adoptive water and other technologies.
• Experience of working in a large project and as part of a diverse team.
Preferred:
• Familiarity with agro-ecological conditions and climate challenges in similar geographies in the country and exclusively desirable is experience of work in Durg district/ Chhattisgarh.
• Experience and interest in working with women farmers and their groups at grass-root level.
• Understanding of adult learning principles.
SKILLS & COMPETENCIES:
Professional competencies:
• Strong facilitation /training and communication skills.
• Willingness to learn from and replicate best practices from elsewhere.
• Good writing and oral communication skills in English and Hindi.
• Proficiency in MS Office Suite mainly Word, PowerPoint and Excel, Internet.
• Understanding of tribal development and gender dimensions within Climate Smart Agriculture and Nutrition Security domains.
• Ability work in a team and build capacity and connect to community stakeholders.
Personal attributes:
• High level of integrity and honesty.
• Communicates with impact.
• Compassionate, and respectful of all people.
• Adaptable and flexible.
The job profile of the position is attached for details. Candidates should send their resumes to http://103.25.172.32/phrcare/Recruitment/List/RJobApplyList.aspx to apply for the position online.
The last date of receiving applications will be 14th August, 2020. Only short-listed candidates would be contacted.
CARE India is an equal opportunity and diversity promoting employer. Therefore Women, persons differently abled, SC/ST/ OBC candidates are especially encouraged to apply.
