The Rainforest Alliance is creating a more sustainable world by using social and market forces to protect nature and improve the lives of farmers and forest communities. To achieve our mission, we partner with diverse allies around the world to drive positive change across global supply chains and in many of our most critically important natural landscapes.

Our alliance spans 70 countries and includes farmers and forest communities, companies, governments, civil society, and millions of individuals. Together we work to protect forests and biodiversity, take action on climate, and promote the rights and improve the livelihoods of rural people.

As an international nonprofit organization with more than 30 years of experience in sustainability transformation, we understand that the social and economic well-being of rural communities is tightly connected to ecosystem health. This knowledge has shaped our rigorous programs to advance sustainable land-use and commodity production.

At the Rainforest Alliance we combat climate change, protect forests and biodiversity, promote human rights, and improve livelihoods. The enormity of the social and environmental challenges we are facing requires working together in a broad alliance. This is why we bring farmers, forest communities, companies, and consumers together to change the way the world produces, sources, and consumes.

Why

To protect nature and improve lives it’s becoming increasingly urgent that we approach the way we use our land and produce food and other products in more sustainable ways. For this to succeed we need to fundamentally change the way that businesses operate and source, and the choices we all make as consumers.

How

Our growing global alliance aims to transform our relationship with our natural resources and each other, to create a better future for people and nature together.

The Rainforest Alliance encourages diversity and inclusion across the global organization. With this commitment to diversity, we are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and do not discriminate on the basis of gender, race, color, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, ages, disability and any other protected group.

Position summary:

At Rainforest Alliance we are looking for a Senior Associate, Gender and Social Inclusion who will be responsible for mainstreaming gender equality and youth inclusion in the RESTORE (Resilient Ecosystems and Sustainable Transformation of Rural Economies) project in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana. The Senior Associate will work in collaboration with Rainforest Alliance staff, partners, consultants, and other relevant stakeholders to develop and support the program’s gender and youth policies, strategies and activities in order to deliver expected outcomes and impacts, specifically with regards to gender and youth.

The position includes training, awareness raising and advising technical staff, partners and field consultants on gender and youth, developing strategies to mainstream gender and youth inclusivity, ensuring that a gender and youth perspective is included in the project situation analysis, Theory of Change, planning, monitoring, evaluation and learning framework (PMEL), budget, pathways and interventions, ensuring proper outcome and indicator management and reporting and learning on key findings. The incumbent is expected to coordinate closely with other Rainforest Alliance units including the theme leads on gender and youth.

Responsibilities: 

• Coordinate and support gender and youth inclusion policies development and mainstreaming within RESTORE project and other field programs of both countries;
• Collaborate in the design, implementation of field-based baseline analyses to understand needs, gaps and its root causes, and opportunities for women and youth and incorporate findings in the RESTORE project pathways and interventions;
• Coordinate with colleagues to carry out a stakeholder mapping and develop and maintain contacts with relevant actors like local organizations, governments, business to support the interventions of the project and facilitate its sustainability;
• Coordinate with colleagues to design and provide training, awareness raising, technical assistance and coaching to staff, program partners, and field consultants on gender and youth perspectives and support them in including these in their way of working;
• Collaborate in the development of tools and strategies tailored towards improving gender and youth inclusivity in all programs and interventions while promoting a gender transformative approach;
• Support project team to facilitate exchanges to share lessons learned and experience between the two countries related to gender and youth perspectives;
• Support efforts to steer gender and youth program to support financial inclusion, business entrepreneurship initiatives, access to markets and diversification processes;
• Support the Chief of Party and project managers in the preparation of quality and timely program technical reports with regards to the progress, learnings and best practices as required by donor and in the preparation of presentations to partners, landscape stakeholders and other actors, and
• Other responsibilities as assigned.

Qualifications: 

• Bachelor’s Degree in International Development, Community Development, Gender, Social Sciences, Economics or related field;
• Minimum 4 years of experience in similar position, including minimum of 2 years of experience in working on gender and youth programs;
• Strong knowledge of gender and youth related issues in the cocoa sector of Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire, preferably with knowledge of environmental issues;
• Experience in gender analysis, tool development, mainstreaming, household methodologies, entrepreneurship, leadership skills and related topics, and with participatory investigation and learning methods;
• Experience developing and implementing programs and initiatives to build capacity and representation of gender and youth, alternative opportunities;
• Experience developing and implementing participatory training and awareness processes on social inclusion with staff, organizations, and communities;
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills;
• Fluency in English and French required; fluency in one of the main local languages of Ghana or Ivory Coast is a plus
• Willingness and ability to travel locally and between Ghana/ Côte d'Ivoire potentially at least 30% of the time.

Salary:

Commensurate with experience.

Deadline: September 14, 2022

Notes:

Only candidates authorized to work in Côte d'Ivoire will be considered.

If you have any questions about the job vacancy, please contact the HR department: recruitment@ra.org