Program Officer – Gender and Safeguarding Officer at Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA): (Deadline 12 April 2025)

Program Officer – Gender and Safeguarding Officer at Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA): (Deadline 12 April 2025)

Program Officer – Gender and Safeguarding Officer

Location: Kigali, Rwanda

Job Reference: GSO/PD/RW/03/2025

AGRA and its Work to Transform Agriculture

AGRA is an African-led institution that actively supports the drive towards inclusive agricultural transformation and sustainable food systems. We do this by empowering the continent’s 33 million smallholder farming households to transform their agriculture from a struggle to survive to profitable businesses. The continent’s farmers regularly face challenges, and we aspire to provide uniquely African solutions that respond to their agricultural and environmental challenges, leading to increased harvests for reduced hunger and more income.

Working in alignment with the development priorities of our focus countries, we enable farmers to access improved and high-yielding seeds, gain knowledge on sustainable farming, and linkages to profitable markets.

In our work, we aspire to build the alliances, partnerships, and networks required to drive an inclusive agricultural transformation. We work with our partners to create an equitable youth-friendly environment that harnesses the youth dividend on the continent to drive growth and facilitate open employment opportunities for young women and men. We achieve our key objectives through a focus on the following four areas of intervention:

1. Policy and state capability – We support governments in creating an enabling environment for private sector involvement in agricultural transformation.
2. Seed systems – We trigger higher productivity by increasing the availability and access to improved seeds by farmers allowing them to increase their harvests for food security and better incomes.
3. Sustainable farming – We support farmers in building resilient farming systems for sustained high yields through interventions such as mechanization and irrigation.
4. Inclusive markets and trade – We work to increase the linkages between farmers, and other market actors for a positive, sustained cycle of commercialization and reinvestment.

Why Join Us?

People are the heartbeat of our organization and remain the true drivers of our delivery, impact, and success.

We have cultivated a workplace that fuels Depth in Collaboration, Excellence in Execution, Constructive Engagements, and a spirit of being Increasingly Entrepreneurial; all underpinned by our cherished I-RISE Values (Integrity, Respect, Innovation, Stewardship and Equity)

We work with incredible people and partners who have roots in farming communities across the African continent combined with an inclusive, diverse, and talented workforce from over 25 nationalities. Our commitment to a call to action goes beyond ourselves as we arise to catalyze African Food Systems transformation and improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers.

We are looking for people who are passionate about being part of a mission-driven team that is making a real difference on the continent; love to work on cutting edge Ag technologies; and able to grow their skills, expertise, and experience career growth, while enjoying very competitive compensation and benefits.

Are you ready to embark on this exciting transformative journey with us?

The Position

Safeguarding — Job Reference: GSO/PD/RW/03/2025

The Safeguarding officer will build the capacity of country teams, partners, and grantees by integrating gender and safeguard measures at the country levels and working with AGRA teams, consultants, and external partners to help them understand gender and safeguard issues and response measures for AGRA investments.

S/he will be responsible for designing, implementing, and monitoring initiatives, policies, and plans that align with AGRA’s objectives to ensure safety and protection of those we work with from harassment, sexual exploitation and all forms of abuse .

Key Duties and Responsibilities:

• Lead the analysis to identify context specific risks and vulnerabilities for youth and women and identify potential areas/concerns for gender and safeguarding plan
• Develop AGRA’s safeguarding framework in close consultation with the gender and legal unit, develop necessary tools for aligning safeguarding framework with AGRAs programmatic work.
• Develop and implement a comprehensive framework that effectively integrates social safeguard protocols into AGRA Country’s agricultural development initiatives. Ensure that these protocols are seamlessly aligned with the organization’s overall objectives.
• Leads the development of implementation plan based on findings from the various analyses (gender analysis, youth aspiration analysis, ecosystem mapping and value chain analysis) at country level.
• Identify and develop practical response system towards safeguarding issues such as harassment, abuse , allegations of harm, exploitation or misconduct within AGRA’s programs and promoting a safe and inclusive working environment for youth and women in AGRA’s programs and operations
• Guarantee that AGRA’s interventions address the circumstances, needs, aspirations, and priorities of youth and women, providing equal employment opportunities to prevent adverse effects on vulnerable groups.
• Collaborate with the gender and inclusiveness team to create region-specific training modules and awareness-raising materials on gender and safeguards principles, including relevant case studies and good practices.
• Implement ongoing training for AGRA staff, partners, community members, and stakeholders on the application and compliance with gender and safeguarding requirements through online webinars and in-country sessions
• Assist in ensuring that new grants to local partners and proposals to donors comply with safeguarding standards
• Oversee and ensure strict adherence to rigorous health and safety standards across all agricultural projects, effectively reducing risks for workers and stakeholders
• Share results and lessons learned during AGRA Program implementation of gender and safeguarding to enhance performance and maintain standards
• Assess the effectiveness of gender and safeguarding tools and best practices related to youth and women’s employment in agriculture, making recommendations for improvement.
• Uphold ethical work practices across all projects, guaranteeing that labor rights are protected and maintained in line with the Country’s labor regulations
• Promote active participation of gender and women-focused NGOs, civil society organizations, and government entities working on gender equality and youth to learn, share lessons, and magnify impact.
• Take proactive measures within AGRA Country’s agricultural initiatives to prevent child labor, with support from relevant institutions and departments
• Implement strategies that align with national and international standards to keep child labor at bay.

Key Qualifications and Experience required:

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent in gender studies, social science, international development, humanitarian or related discipline.
• Strong knowledge of the existing gender and youth safeguards policies/framework at country and continental level, particularly relating to agriculture and agrifood sector.
• Possesses a good understanding of stakeholders, women and youth organization, collectives, networks and associations at country and continental level which best represent the voices and interests of youth and women employment in agriculture sectors.
• Strong understanding of the agricultural landscape in country, including knowledge of key stakeholders, challenges, and opportunities for employment creation.
• Experience working in the fields of gender, youth and enterprise development preferably with focus on youth and women employment, entrepreneurship in agriculture sector with demonstrated experience working directly with national level counterparts and local communities.
• Excellent track record in leading the design, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation of projects/programs, and in influencing partners and stakeholders to achieve goals and objectives.

Behavioral Competencies

• Ability to drive collaboration through inclusive and agile teaming, breaking siloes, sharing information celebrating joint successes.
• Ability to execute excellently by delivering high-quality work at speed, committing to decisions and plans, and increasing accountability to deliver impact at scale.
• Ability to be sincerely constructive in interactions with others by demonstrating trust, sincerity, and care, in recognition of our joint purpose.
• Ability be increasingly entrepreneurial by breaking hierarchies, embracing learning and innovation to unlock the potential of diversity and ideas.

 If you believe you are the right candidate for this position, kindly submit your application with a detailed CV (including your e-mail and telephone contacts) to [email protected] Please quote the job reference number in the subject line of the application e-mail.

Applications must be received on or before 12^th April 2025.

Due to the large volumes of applications, we usually receive, we will only be able to contact those candidates who are shortlisted.

For more information on the AGRA, visit www.agra.org.