Global Communities Materials development consultant Job Vacancy in Rwanda

CONSULTANCY OPPORTUNITY

Global Communities is an international non-profit organization that
works closely with communities worldwide to bring about sustainable change that
improves the lives and livelihoods of the vulnerable. Global Communities has
been a leading force in the cooperative development movement beginning with the
U.S. cooperative housing movement in 1952.

Cooperatives are internationally recognized mechanisms for
fostering financial and economic growth in developing countries and are
particularly effective in transitional economies, where there is limited access
to capital and where vocational and technical skills are limited. Cooperative
structures allow individuals to pool their resources and skills together to
work toward a common economic goal, such as crop production,

with the ultimate
aim of increasing member incomes and ensuring greater food security. By working
together, cooperative members accomplish economic goals and objectives that
could not be achieved by one individual alone.

The EMIRGE Program: Enabling Market Integration through Rural Group
Empowerment (EMIRGE) is a five year cooperative agreement that was issued
through the IDEA Network within USAID and now resides in the Economic Growth,
Environment and Education Bureau (E3) at USAID. The EMIRGE program aims
to improve incomes of small-scale farmers by increasing the agricultural yields
of small-holder producer groups and cooperatives in Rwanda and Mongolia. The
EMIRGE teams work with cooperatives to significantly improve their management
behaviors, to help them break away from unproductive traditional methods and
enables them to become more cohesive, integrated cooperative businesses in
order to improve their operations and to increase their production.

Global
Communities seeks a Materials Development Consultant to professionally
illustrate program materials for our Enabling Market Integration through Rural
Group Empowerment (EMIRGE) program in Rwanda.

Position title: materials development consultant

Duty station: Kigali, Rwanda

Contract duration: Maximum of 30 days

Objectives
and Responsibilities: Global Communities seeks a Materials Development Consultant to
professionally package and illustrate technical program materials specifically
for the EMIRGE Rwanda Team. These materials will be used to showcase the work
of the EMIRGE Rwanda team and will allow the team to share “best practices” and
learnings with key stakeholders in the cooperative development and agricultural
sector. The Materials Development Consultant must have a demonstrated ability
to professionally package program materials of a publishable quality. The
Consultant should also have a working knowledge of agriculture and the
cooperative development sector.

Materials to be Professionally Packaged:

1. The Cooperative Performance Index: In 2012, a tool called the Cooperative
Performance

Index
(CPI) was developed by the EMIRGE program in Rwanda. The CPI is a monitoring
and evaluation tool used to track the progress and development of cooperatives
across Rwanda. Each cooperative is assessed by seven key dimensions, including:
cooperative fundamentals, recruitment and retention strategy, governance,
production and quality of inputs, management structure, accounting systems, and
market linkages and relationships. The CPI tool was implemented in Rwanda in
2012 and again in 2013, with slight modifications to its design. Global
Communities seeks a Consultant that can create an illustrative field guide, of
a maximum of approximately 20 pages, to showcase the updated CPI tool in
English and Kinyarwanda. The estimated level of effort for the CPI tool is
eight to ten working days.

2. Farmer Field School (FFS) Materials: In line with
the Government of Rwanda’s efforts to

improve
agricultural productivity and food security, Global Communities is providing
technical assistance to our portfolio of cooperatives. An agricultural
consultant in Rwanda has created several working reports detailing the EMIRGE
program’s research, analysis, and results in using FFS to develop our
cooperatives. The EMIRGE program is particularly focused on testing soil
quality and using bio-intensive and organic composting methods to improve
soils. Global Communities’ seeks a Consultant to develop a field practitioner
manual of approximately 40 pages or less, with accompanying handouts, to
document the EMIRGE program’s approach in using FFS to strengthen the technical
capacity of our cooperatives. The Consultant must be highly proficient in
writing and editing in English and Kinyarwanda in order to document the work of
the agricultural consultant. The estimated level of effort to package the FFS
materials is a maximum of 20 working days.

Tasks:

·
Review the 2012 Cooperative Performance Index
publication and the working materials developed for the revised 2013
Cooperative Performance Index;

·
Review all reports and documentation on the EMIRGE
program’s Farmer Field School work with Rwandan cooperatives;

Confer and discuss deliverables with field
staff from the EMIRGE Rwanda Team and technical staff in the Economic
Development Unit at headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland. Using the
following process:

o
Initial
meeting conducted via Skype with EMIRGE Rwanda field staff and HQ Program
Manager and HQ Technical Officer to introduce the Consultant to the EMIRGE
program and the overarching expectations of the consultancy;

o
Followed
by a workshop with EMIRGE Rwanda field staff and agronomist lead by EMIRGE
Rwanda Field Director, analyzing and discussing the Cooperative Performance
Index and the Farmer Field School more in-depth;

o
An
additional follow-up meeting with EMIRGE Rwanda Field Staff and HQ Program
Manager and HQ Technical Officer over Skype to discuss any questions or
concerns that the Consultant may have prior to crafting the tools;

o
First
draft of CPI to be submitted by Consultant to EMIRGE Rwanda field team and HQ
Program Manager and HQ Technical Officer for review, comments and feedback;

o
Using
initial feedback, the Consultant will make edits and submit a second draft of
CPI to EMIRGE Rwanda field team and HQ Program Manager and HQ Technical Officer
for review, comments and feedback;

o
Submit
finalized draft of CPI to EMIRGE Rwanda field staff and HQ Program Manager and
Technical Officer;

o
Submit
first draft of FFS tool by Consultant to EMIRGE Rwanda field team and HQ
Program Manager and HQ Technical Officer for review, comments and feedback (FFS
tool can be started once CPI tool is complete or can be done simultaneously as
long as the quality of the tools are maintained);

o
Using
initial feedback, the Consultant will make edits and submit a second draft of
FFS tool to EMIRGE Rwanda field staff and HQ Program Manager and HQ
Technical Officer for review, comments and feedback;

o
Consultant
to create a third draft of FFS tool to submit to EMIRGE Rwanda field team and
HQ Program Manager and HQ Technical Officer for final review and edits;

o
Consultant
to submit a finalized draft of the FFS tool to EMIRGE Rwanda field team and HQ
Program Manager and HQ Technical Officer;

Deliverables:

Cooperative Performance Index Assessment
Manual –
Professionally capture the updated 2013 Cooperative Performance Index
assessment process in a field guide or manual of a maximum of 20 pages in
both English and Kinyarwanda; the manual should be able to be used in the
following ways:

o
Provide
implementation steps, i.e. a “How to Guide” for field staff;

o
Should
provide a 2nd “How to” section for cooperative self-assessment of
cooperative progress;

o
Provide
detailed instructions on the scoring mechanism;

o
Provide
instructions on how to set progress against dimensional goals;

o
Provide
a section of resources for each of the 5 cooperative development dimensions
where field practitioners and cooperatives can link to resources;

o
Provide
a section on lessons learned;

·
Cooperative Farmer Field School Manual:
Create a professional manual for a field practitioner facilitator and
participation guides for cooperative members in both English and Kinyarwanda
documenting the EMIRGE program’s FFS approach, not to exceed 40 pages;

·
Manuals should be ready to go to final layout and
print at the conclusion of the consultancy

·
Presentation to Global Communities
Rwanda team and collaborative experts on the materials consultancy and the end
products which includes a short description of the process and the final
products and how they will be useful to the development community at large.

Qualifications, Skills and Experience:

·
University degree in journalism/marketing and/or
agriculture, international development or rural development is required;

·
Minimum of 7 years creating professional
publications for development organizations is required;

·
Demonstrated ability to synthesize and analyze
complex information gathered from program discussions, reports and monitoring
and evaluation data is required;

·
Demonstrated ability to appropriately place
photographs, charts, graphs, maps, and other visual aids in field manuals and
guidelines so these materials can quickly and easily be used by field staff in
programming efforts;

·
Knowledge of the cooperative development sector is
required;

·
Excellent writing and editing abilities in English
are required;

·
Fluency in Kinyarwanda is preferred.

How
to apply

Interested applicants are requested to submit the following
documents:

1.
Technical proposal including Cover letter;
Executive summary; Proposed Methodology & Timeline, Evidence of
consultant(s) qualifications; references for similar work done and proof of
service (minimum of three).

2.
Financial proposal detailing all costs associated
with the delivery of the above services. Note: All logistical costs
including transportation, data collection fees and printing costs will be
covered by the consultant and should be detailed in the financial proposal.

Applications will be received electronically through the email
address info@rw.globalcommunities.org
and should be titled ‘Material
Development Consultant’. The submissions should be received no
later than 5PM on July 17th, 2014. Only
shortlisted candidates will be contacted.

Global
Communities is a member of the Network of International NGOs

(NINGO) /
Rwanda.