Consultant- Agronomist at International Potato Center

Objective

• Provide technical support in sweet potato agronomy to CIP projects and initiatives in Kenya and Eastern Africa Region as well as Packaging of sweet potato advisory content using various format for various farmer facing organization using human centered design.
• Contribute to the design and direct the implementation of a sustainable sweetpotato seed systems strategy that will assure quality and accessibility of sweetpotato planting material for production and commercialization of the sweetpotato value chain
• Design and implement a working, cost-effective and timely planting material dissemination approaches and root production plans with partners to enhance OFSP production among households both for food and nutrition security as well as commercialization.
• Work and collaborate with national government partners, KALRO and other stakeholders to initiate, coordinate and manage the National Performance Evaluation (NPTs) and varietal release process for developing commercially viable OFSP varieties, development and dissemination of Early Generation Seed (EGS).
• Participate in the development and, where possible, delivery of appropriate training modules in priority topics such as production, agronomy, post-harvesting management etc. The training will target sweetpotato value chain actors including farmers, extension agents, aggregators, processors etc.
• Provide support to the project team by facilitating timely, accurate and routine data collection required for project reports.
• Working with other stakeholders and colleagues to develop linkages and contribute to online platforms for the exchange of information about OFSP for widespread adoption.

Deliverables

• Significant contribution and leadership to the design and implementation of a sustainable sweetpotato seed systems strategy to support Ukama Ustawi initiative and partnership with WFP.
• Develop and implement a cost-effective and timely planting material dissemination and root production plan,which involves at least 50000 cuttings of EGS produced for further multiplication and at least 1000HHs reach with clean planting material.
• Work with KALRO to develop and implement a work plan relating to the coordination and management of the National Performance Evaluation (NPEs) and varietal release process for developing commercially viable OFSP varieties in Kenya

Selection Criteria

• PhD in Agriculture, agronomy, breeding, crop science or a related Field
• Minimum of 4 years of experience working with public and/or private organizations in seed systems or agronomy
• Experience working with sweet potato and/or other vegetative propagated crops.
• Experience in designing and conducting and analysis of on-farm agronomic experiments.
• Experience with participatory evaluation of new technologies and innovations with farmers.
• Experimental design, Implementation, data collection, analysis and writing of scientific papers.
• Advanced level of MS Office.
• Nutrition messaging.
• Advanced oral communication and technical writing skills in English

Time frame

• The consultancy contract will be for 6 months.