USAID/Rwanda Hinga Wunguke
Gender Equity and Social Inclusion (GESI) Advisor
CNFA
CNFA is a not-for-profit organization based in Washington, D.C., dedicated to stimulating economic growth in the agricultural sector by nurturing entrepreneurship, private enterprise, and market linkages. CNFA specializes in fostering private sector investments in training, new technologies and marketing to increase the overall competitiveness of agricultural value chains and rural development, to increase people’s incomes, to develop skills in the rural workforce, and to facilitate exports.
Program Description USAID/Rwanda Hinga Wunguke
The Feed the Future Rwanda Hinga Wunguke Activity (Hinga Wunguke) is a five-year (January 16, 2023, to January 15, 2028) USAID-funded $28 million initiative that aims to increase incomes and improve nutritional outcomes by sustainably increasing agricultural productivity and strengthening domestic consumption and markets for high-value and nutritious agricultural products. Hinga Wunguke is designed with four complementary objectives: (1) agriculture productivity sustainably in-creased, (2) farmers’ and agribusinesses’ access to finance increased, (3) producer market out-comes improved, and (4) the enabling environment to foster market driven agriculture strengthened. Hinga Wunguke uses an MSD approach to facilitate systems changes in relationships and behaviors in market systems of key value chains of nutritious food products, from the production to consumption stage.
As a program designed to transform market systems, Hinga Wunguke focuses on active engagement with all viable market systems agents, including businesses, the Government of Rwanda (GoR), and civil society organizations. With technical and financial support and facilitation, these partners can adopt and test innovative ideas and to assess and scale successful innovations and practices that im-prove the production of selected high value agricultural products and consumption of nutritious (processed or unprocessed) foods.
Position Description
Under the supervision of the Hinga Wunguke Market Systems Director, the Gender Equity and Social Inclusion Advisor will lead efforts to operationalize gender equity and social inclusion throughout programming. The Advisor will work closely with the four Component Leads (productivity; access to finance; market, and nutrition development; and enabling environment facilitation) to ensure that gender equity and social inclusion principles are integrated into all Activity approaches and interventions, adhering to USAID and global best practices. S/he will lead outreach efforts to identify root causes of exclusion, and enable project participants (e.g. market actors, financial institutions, government agencies, etc.) to collaboratively identify the mutual benefits of including women, youth, persons with disabilities, and other marginalized groups as suppliers, customers, clients, etc.
In addition, s/he will design community-led empowerment approaches and interventions that use principles of inclusion to increase income, nutritious food access and affordability and improve nutrition status of women, youth, persons with disabilities, and other marginalized groups in a gender-equitable way. S/he will work with the respective Directors to ensure that gender equity and social inclusion concerns are considered in the development and implementation of the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) Plan. S/he will collaborate with other components to design, develop and implement the women/youth led interventions in relation with the Gender and Youth strategies’ recommendations. The Gender Equity and Social Inclusion Advisor is based in Kigali.
Duties and Responsibilities
The main duties of the Gender Equity & Social Inclusion Advisor include, but are not limited to:
- Provide strategic leadership and vision to mainstream gender and social inclusion throughout all project activities;
- Lead efforts to build the capacity of program staff and other key stakeholders including market actors and government partners to mainstream gender and social inclusion.
- Collaborate with all project staff, but principally the Component leads, to ensure activity design and implementation adhere to gender and social inclusion principles;
- Conduct trainings and Trainings of Trainers (ToT) for program staff and BDS providers to support the development and implementation of gender and social inclusion approaches to ensure women, youth, persons with disabilities and other excluded groups are included in the market system;
- Use relevant USAID-approved tools and methodologies to promote gender equity and social inclusion, within activity design, implementation, monitoring, and among relevant stakeholders.
- Promote male engagement and positive youth development, and introduce notions of positive masculinity regarding gender norms and roles in agriculture, agribusiness, finance, nutrition, and policy;
- Design and implement tools to understand women’s roles in agriculture – including their decision-making over what is produced, why, and how through increased access to assets, inputs, and services;
- Work collaboratively with various external partners and demonstrating business cases, win-win approaches on GESI mainstreaming in interventions.
- Design interventions to increase women and vulnerable people’s access to opportunities to generate income; increase women’s participation in decisions on the use of household income to purchase nutritious foods and promote a more equitable division of time and labor
- Collaborate with the MEL Unit to ensure that the outcomes and impact of the gender and social inclusion approaches are measured and evaluated for constant learning and improvement.
- Promote and support the use of gender- youth and disability-inclusive standard qualitative and quantitative indicators.
- Lead the implementation of GESI and youth strategies and document GESI success stories;
- Maintain and develop strong relationships with relevant stakeholders including by representing the Activity at the technical working groups, among relevant government ministries and staff, and collaborating with other implementing partners.
- Contribute to timely, accurate and appropriate reporting of program activities and results to the donor, including progress reports and annual reports;
- Undertake other assignments or tasks at the request of the Chief of Party.
Qualifications
- At least 5 years’ professional experience in designing, managing, and implementing development programming, with a focus on gender and social inclusion in Rwanda;
- A minimum of a Master’s degree in a relevant subject or a Bachelor’s degree with an additional four years (making 9 years) of relevant technical work experience in gender studies, sociology, anthropology, international development studies, or other related field is required;
- Demonstrated experience providing technical assistance to support gender equity and social inclusion in USG- funded projects using the Market Systems Development (MSD) approach in the agriculture or economic development projects preferred.
- Experience in the development and implementation of gender and social inclusion training for international organizations, NGOs, other civil society organizations and the private sector.
- Experience in gender analysis, and familiar with youth and disability engagement in private sector programs.
- Understanding of the constraints that prevent women, youth, and persons with disabilities from integrating into market systems.
- Familiarity with USAID tools and methodologies is highly desirable.
- Familiarity with nutrition sensitive and climate smart agriculture concepts is highly desirable.
- Demonstrated ability to interact and communicate with wide range of stakeholders both verbally and in writing is required.
- Strong verbal and written skills in English and Kinyarwanda are required. Knowledge of French is an asset.
Application Instructions
All interested and qualified Candidate can send their application (motivation letter, updated CV, certificates and references) documents to: hingawunguke@cnfarwanda.org not later than May 29th at 11:30 PM East Africa time. Please quote the job title in the subject. Only candidates selected for interview will be notified.
