Regenerative Agricultural Design (RAD) Specialist

Are you passionate about supporting people and communities to adapt to climate change? Do you have deep knowledge and experience of agro-ecology, specifically related to food security and livelihood development in fragile contexts? Are you a strong communicator and confident as a leader and trainer in your technical field?

Who are we?

The Programme and Policy Division is the main ‘engine room’ for programmatic policy and development for the global organisation. It houses DRC’s overall Response Framework, which guides how we programme worldwide, our Core Sectors, as well HQ units related to cross-cutting work on emergency response, localisation, and climate & environment.

About the job

The overall responsibility of the RAD Specialist is to lead the regenerative agricultural agenda for DRC globally, by steering programme design and delivering technical capacity building relevant to DRC’s response to displacement. You will assist in developing, piloting and leading the roll-out of a regenerative design plan in DRC to gradually build up our organizational skill set. This includes strengthening cross-country learning and providing technical guidance and training for DRC’s regions & country operations in line with global good practices on agroecology, land and hydrological restoration and resource management. In so doing, you will help to maintain and develop DRC’s competitive position as a global leader in Regenerative Agriculture and Food Systems Strengthening in Displacement.

The responsibilities of the RAD Specialist will be threefold and focus on 1) Technical guidance and support to COs and ROs, 2) Capacity Strengthening and learning, and 3) Advocacy and Strategic Support. Among others:

• Provide technical guidance and support for Regional and Country staff on regenerative agroecosystem design interventions, building capacities through in-person, site-based training and demonstrations. Technical fields may include a broad range (as per your technical background): hydrological stabilization, rainwater banking, biologically active soil building, biodiversity development, seed bank design and implementation, bio-fertilization, ecological integrated pest management and regenerative value chain development. This will include establishing and ensuring long-term management of demonstration sites by selected country offices through replication of good practises.
• Strengthen Capacity and learning by among others, ensuring institutional knowledge management, establish a community of practice on regenerative agricultural and land restoration comprised of trained staff from DRC regions, as well as collecting and sharing good practices based on systematic learning from the field demonstration sites
• Play an active role in Advocacy and Strategy Support, including supporting RAD strategy development and building partnerships, supporting evidence-building and learning and link to other Regenerative Agriculture research efforts and consortiums. You will share through public fora/presentations and speaking engagements DRCs Regenerative Agriculture and Food Systems Strengthening Portfolio linking with the global resilience design movement, their resources, research and community of practice.

About you

To be successful in this role we expect you to have a minimum of 6 years’ experience in progressively more senior roles within regenerative agriculture and land restoration as well as in providing hands-on technical support through RA cascading, inclusive of designing, implementing, and managing interventions at community level within fragile and conflict-affected contexts. This should include overseeing or delivering technical support and training to support complex, multisector adaptation initiatives, including in fragile and conflict-affected locations.

You should enjoy bringing innovative ideas to colleagues and helping them develop their capacity. You need to be driven and self-organized, able to work independently as well as cooperating closely with a broad range of staff at all levels of the organization.

All employees should master DRC's core competencies: Communicating, Taking the lead, Collaborating, Striving for excellence and Demonstrating integrity. Moreover, we also expect the following:

Required

• Advanced University degree in Ecological Restoration, Planning and Community Development, Agroecology and Rural Development or related areas.
• Up-to-date strong technical knowledge in one or more specific areas, such as permaculture, regenerative design, agroecology, landscape restoration planning. Familiarity with the Resilience Design methodology is an added advantage.
• Experience working in different country contexts, e.g. beyond project-specific role(s) in one country, and from different ecological landscapes.
• Experience delivering technical trainings in regenerative design and/or permaculture at household, farm, and landscape levels
• Strong ability to establish collaborative working relationships across dispersed geographical locations 
• Familiarity with GIS and key mapping databases and resources.
• Strong computer skills (MS Word, Excel, Outlook and Power Point)
• Able and willing to travel a minimum of 50% of your time. Anticipate a lot of travelling to demonstration sites to build upon capacity trainings, monitoring of results on the ground etc.
• Demonstrated experience in implementing complex, integrated programming in fragile and conflict-affected contexts.

We offer

Contract length: 1 year with possibility of extension, subject to confirmed funding.

Workplace: The position is located in one of DRC’s regional offices or in a DRC country office. Therefore, if you are interested in and qualified for this position, please indicate your preferred DRC duty station in your cover letter. Due to visa restrictions, DRC’s Regional office in Nairobi is not an option for this position unless the candidate is already a Kenyan resident.

Start date: 1st of March 2025 or as soon as possible thereafter

Application process

All applicants must send a cover letter and an updated CV in English.
Closing date for applications: 12th of January 2025. We expect to conduct interviews during the last weeks of January 2025.

Further information

For questions regarding the vacancy please contact Lillah Emmik Sørensen, Global Lead on Climate and Environment: lillah.soerensen@drc.ngo or Head of the Global Economic Recovery Unit and Line manager Solenne Delga: solenne.delga@drc.ngo. For further information about the Danish Refugee Council, please consult our website drc.ngo.