Job Opportunities at Mennonite Economic Development Associates (MEDA)

Mennonite Economic Development Associates (MEDA), is an international economic development organization whose mission is to create business solutions to poverty. Founded in 1953 by a group of Mennonite business professionals, we partner with the poor to start or grow small and medium-sized businesses in developing regions around the world.


We are recruiting to fill the position below:




Job Title: Communications Officer

Location: Bauchi
Supervisor : Field Project Manager
Job Status: Start Date TBA; Full-time 1-year contract renewable up to 5 Years

Project Profile
Global Affairs Canada (GAC) and MEDA are supporting 16,000 women and youth entrepreneurs and small-scale businesses to improve their business performance in the agricultural sector in Bauchi State, while also increasing the awareness and capacity to address issues of early and forced child marriage with 25,000 community and family members.

Over five years (2017-2022), the project will focus on selected agricultural value chains originating in Bauchi State to improve the business performance and environment for entrepreneurs and small-scale businesses. The project will focus on small scale business of women and youth in selected agriculture sectors to improve productivity, increase access to markets, financial services and information and to incorporate environmentally sustainable practices. 

The project will work with families and communities to better understand the risks of early and forced child marriage and benefits of engaging women and youth in entrepreneurship through awareness campaigns, employment and entrepreneurship skills building, provision of safe spaces, networking and mentorship opportunities.

Position Summary

• The Communications Officer will coordinate with the MEDA WAY team members to design and implement the program’s communications and information strategy.
• The communication strategy is for the project to support effective messaging about the project with a variety of stakeholders.
• The information strategy is more programmatic and refers to the information space available to the project’s clients and how information is used as a tool for development in the three value chains.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Implement the project’s Communications Strategy
• Develop communications content for project reports, website, Facebook, and other print materials including writing client stories, quarterly newsletters, blogs and articles and house these in an organised database for the use of the project.
• Plan and execute events and campaigns that promotes the successes of women and youth small producers
• Develop an informational strategy with MEDA Nigeria’s partners namely FOMWAN and BAHRN to raise the level of dialogue in the public space about where and how girls are entering the market system and the threats and risks to them as well as awareness about the risks of early and forced child marriage (EFCM) as part of the project’s strategy to advocate the risks of EFCM into Marketing and Communications Strategy
• Assist with research and evaluating the most effective approaches to reach women and youth and continue building communications and marketing linkages that will strengthen women and youth’s access to a full range of information on an ongoing basis
• Routinely collect information (such as news articles) on agriculture, economic development, early and forced child marriage and women/youth empowerment in Nigeria to share with office staff
• Other communication and administrative duties as assigned
• Any other tasks as may be assigned by the line manager or management
• Apply MEDA’s values in all activities  cultural sensitivity, transparency and integrity in all relationships.

Qualifications

• University degree in Marketing, Communications, Journalism, Economics, Business Administration, International Development or related field
• Strong writing, photography, social media and graphic design skills
• Independent, self-directed and highly motivated
• Knowledge of international and business development concepts
• Demonstrated understanding of other cultures
• Strong English writing skills
• Critical thinker, ability to problem solve and work collaboratively in a team to achieve results
• Strong work ethics and ability to carry out duties at a high professional standard
• Persistent, thorough and ability to deliver timely reports
• Good computing skills including Microsoft office software packages
• Sector experience: agriculture/agribusiness, and/or extractive sectors plus some rural experience
• Fluency in English and Hausa is required.
• Prior work experience in Nigeria is preferred
• Appreciation and support of MEDA’s values, mission and purpose

Job Title: Value Chain & Market Systems Manager

Location: Bauchi
Job Type: Full-time

Project Summary

• MEDA seeks qualified Nigerians to support its Youth Entrepreneurship and Women’s Empowerment in Northern Nigeria project (Nigeria WAY) in Bauchi, Bauchi state.
• Nigeria WAY is a five-year project that will assist economically active poor women and youth to increase their income particularly those who are involved in agro-processing in the rice, soybean, and groundnut value chains.
• The project will work with communities and families to improve the environment where girls grow up.

Job Summary

• The Value Chain & Market Systems Manager leads the team providing technical and leadership support in developing the selected value chains and project activities therein related to agro processing.
• The value chain and market system manager will design value chain upgrade activities, considering gender and youth inclusion criteria as well as identify market actors, and clients to support the objectives of the project in the soybean, groundnut and rice value chains.
• The manager will be an integral member of the project team working closely with the Gender Coordinator and Environment and Technology Coordinator to research and design interventions using best practices and private sector approaches.
• The Value Chain and Market Systems Manager is responsible for project outcomes related to value chain results working closely with project implementing partners with support from MEDA’s headquarter-based technical advisors.
• The position has a start date asap, is full time in a 1-year contract renewable up to 5 Years. Based in Bauchi city, Bauchi state, Nigeria the position entails travel around the state and is supervised by the Deputy Field Project Manager.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Provide expert advice and build core capacities of local implementing partners in developing innovative business services, new business partnerships, market-oriented business responses and effective market information systems.
• Lead ongoing value chain constraints analysis, assessing threats, strengths, opportunities and threats to the value chains, and participating value chain clients
• Conduct specific product and market analyses for the selected value chains
• Develop or revise annual and monthly work plans for selected value chains in close collaboration and consultation with the team
• Include and mainstream the project’s gender, youth and environmental sustainability strategies, with special attention to social outcomes, and monitor these throughout the value chains
• Develop new contacts with stakeholders, businesses, and institutions willing to partner and establish opportunities to leverage their activities to enhance the selected value chains
• Assist in sourcing and developing a database of available business development services, including consultants, niche business organizations, and non-profit business support institutions relating to value chains.
• Identify innovative tools or strategies to show demonstrated impact on value chain upgrading
• Engage partners, such as government and research institutions, private sector and business associations, to identify mutual benefits on the value chain, including reduction of transaction costs, reduced waste, reduction in risk, and to increase market opportunities, i.e., volume and/or profit.

Qualifications

• Graduate qualification in Business Administration, Marketing or other relevant discipline
• Minimum of five years of experience in market/value chain programing and/or agriculture; as an entrepreneur in the private sector; or in business development services
• Knowledge of gender and youth related issues in Nigeria as they relate to value chain development and entrepreneurship
• Ability to work collaboratively to achieve results
• Demonstrated ability to mobilize stakeholders into partnerships and alliances
• Experience in providing capacity building and training to colleagues and project partners
• Knowledge of market systems approaches including quality control, market standards, and/or product development.
• Excellent writing and review skills.
• Willingness to travel to project areas.
• Fluency in English and Hausa is required.
• Prior work experience in Nigeria is preferred and other comparable country context is desirable.

Required language:

• English.

Job Title: Financial Services Specialist

Location: Bauchi
Supervisor : Deputy Field Project Manager
Job Status: Start Date TBA; Full-time 1-year contract renewable up to 5 Years


Project Profile
Global Affairs Canada (GAC) and MEDA are supporting 16,000 women and youth entrepreneurs and small-scale businesses to improve their business performance in the agricultural sector in Bauchi State, while also increasing the awareness and capacity to address issues of early and forced child marriage with 25,000 community and family members.


Over five years (2017-2022), the project will focus on selected agricultural value chains originating in Bauchi State to improve the business performance and environment for entrepreneurs and small-scale businesses. The project will focus on small scale business of women and youth in selected agriculture sectors to improve productivity, increase access to markets, financial services and information and to incorporate environmentally sustainable practices. 


The project will work with families and communities to better understand the risks of early and forced child marriage and benefits of engaging women and youth in entrepreneurship through awareness campaigns, employment and entrepreneurship skills building, provision of safe spaces, networking and mentorship opportunities.

Position Summary

• As part of its value chain approach to enterprise and market development for the poor, MEDA recognizes the need for access to appropriate and affordable financial services throughout the value chain and especially for actors targeted to play critical roles in supporting the participation of larger numbers of poor women producers in three agriculture value chains of soya bean, ground nuts and rice.
• In order to ensure sustainable impact of the project, the project team will partner and work closely with local stakeholders for building their capacity such as local value chain development facilitators, financial and other support service providers and women farmers groups and women leaders.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Research and analyse the local market for financial services, identify and assess the financing needs of the project target clients
• Identify, screen and build relationships with local organizations (microfinance institutions, rural banks, credit unions, guarantee funds and other potential partners) to develop and expand appropriate financial products and delivery models to meet the needs of project clients and meet project goals
• Assess, develop and facilitate implementation of a capacity building plan for the local partners (rural banks, primarily) to ensure scale, accountability and reporting systems serve the project goals
• Design and manage the loan/guarantee fund with the local lending institutions (primarily rural banks) in order to ensure appropriate flow of capital to the project clients and safety of the MEDA loan/guarantee capital
• Propose new financial solutions for the project value chain participants (primarily embedded finance to women farmers in the form of inputs supply on credit from nuclear farmers or input agents and advance payments from processors, nuclear farmers or traders) and facilitate their implementation by designing, testing, adjusting and ensuring affordability and sustainability of those solutions
• Work closely with the project team to increase the ability of the targeted value chain participants (input suppliers, SME Intermediates, and traders where applicable) to access appropriate financial services through partner and non-partner financial institutions (FI)
• Research the opportunities, design and manage the partnership to introduce risk management and other insurance services for the project targeted producers, identify local insurance implementing partners, facilitate their capacity building and innovative insurance product designs for small producers both through direct insurance provision or as part of broader value chain business transaction, test and implementation of the insurance delivery
• Participate and support the field team in reporting, documenting lessons learnt, contribute to value chain finance industry development and provide all other necessary inputs to ensure project success
• Other duties as assigned by the Deputy Field Project Manager

Qualifications

• Minimum Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Economics or Business Administration or minimum three years experience in a related field
• Minimum five years experience in agricultural finance, microfinance, along with experience in value chain development, enterprise development, financial product designs, alternate financial solutions and some exposure to investment would be an advantage
• Experience in establishing and cultivating successful institutional partnerships with a range of institutional types and levels of actors (i.e. commercially-oriented FIs, community-led FIs, technical service providers, government representatives, farmers groups, etc.)
• Experience in training, mentoring and institutional capacity building
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office software
• Demonstrated motivation to help poor and meet project targets, appreciation of MEDA values, business acumen, ability to work with minimum supervision, strong communication skills, willingness to work under pressure and to work extra hours when required
• Appreciation and support of MEDA’s faith, values and goals

Deadline: 17:00; 19th December, 2017.

How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates are required to submit their CV’s and cover letter to: WAYjobapplications@gmail.com

Note: Only short-listed candidates will be contacted.