Food Security & Markets Technical Advisor

About Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps is powered by the belief that a better world is possible. To do this, we know our teams do their best work when they are diverse and every team member feels that they belong. We welcome diverse backgrounds, perspectives, and skills so that we can be stronger and have long-term impact.

Program / Department Summary

Mercy Corps helps communities develop their own ideas to solve Haiti’s most daunting problems by using innovative approaches to bring Haitians new social and economic opportunities and to make their country more secure, productive and just. Established in January 2010, Mercy Corps Haiti has offices in Port-au-Prince, Cap Haitien, Miragoane, Jeremie and more than 80 staff implementing programs in economic development, agriculture, natural resource management and humanitarian response. Mercy Corps’ economic development work is guided by the principles of pro-poor development and demand driven strategies. Mercy Corps takes a progressive approach to development that leads communities and entrepreneurs from relief to sustainable livelihoods to resilience.

General Position Summary

The Food Security & Markets Technical Advisor will be highly experienced in a broad spectrum of food security technical focus areas with responsibility for establishing and managing systems to ensure cohesion across all technical sectors in the program. They will also make sure technical interventions are integrated, layered and sequenced appropriately at all levels of implementation within the BHA activity and other targeted donors. The Technical Advisor will be responsible for ensuring the delivery of high-quality Food Security projects including Livelihood and Nutrition interventions. They will be responsible for developing and evolving the organization’s strategy and future direction in FSL; engaging actively with the Food Security Cluster, local governments, and all other FSL actors; managing a team of staff across dispersed locations; and managing program budgets in an emergency context.

The position includes developing tools for planning, assessment and intervention monitoring; building active community participation into project design and implementation, ensuring design of high quality interventions suited to the local context, monitoring and tracking program activities; designing training modules and delivering trainings for Mercy Corps staff, and designing and supervising baseline and end line surveys. The role will also provide technical expertise to the design and development of new business opportunities, internal research and development projects. Mercy Corps is currently implementing several projects following the 7.2 magnitude earthquake in August 2021, which include water infrastructure repair, household level water practices and hygiene promotion, food security assistance, access to market systems and financial services, livelihoods and agricultural restoration.

This position will ensure that common strategies and approaches are applied consistently.

Essential Job Responsibilities

PROGRAM MANAGEMENT AND IMPLEMENTATION

• Provide overall technical guidance and leadership, mentoring, quality control, and coordination to strengthen food and nutrition security outcomes. Advise program managers and sector specialists on technical aspects of food and nutrition security. Support the Director of Programs in the establishment of a program structure that favors integration between all sectors.
• Contribute to the development and implementation of agency-wide strategies, standards, tools, and best practices in agriculture, livelihoods, food security and landscapes that effectively engage partners, donors, governments, and the private sector.
• Provide technical solutions to country agricultural and food security program teams, remotely and on-site, for strategic planning and how to best apply program design and implementation standards, best practices, partnership principles, tools, and M&E, ensuring high-quality implementation.
• Ensure that crosscutting themes such as adaptive management, resilience and sustainability are fully included within the program strategy.
• Ensure that program implementation is responsive to communities, food security needs, and Haitian policies/priorities, and is consistent with Mercy Corps’ relevant program guidelines, principles, values, and quality standards.
• Provide leadership to Mercy Corps’ engagement in the food security sector, representing the agency and cultivating as well as maintaining relationships with appropriate personnel in priority donor agencies including USAID, USDA, and WFP. Ensure that Mercy Corps’ food security programming is widely recognized externally, and that agency standards are high and consistent for both technical and strategic aspects of food security.
• Support the development of materials and guidance for food assistance programs in varying contexts.
• Support, train and conduct market assessments to determine the needs for food assistance and the most appropriate food assistance modality, including cash, voucher, and in-kind distributions through local and/or regional purchase.
• Provide technical assistance in implementation of food assistance components of multi-purpose, food security, or other programs.
• In coordination with the country PAQ department, monitor the implementation of activities through regular field visits and assessments to ensure program quality and impact.
• Identify, document, and share best practices and lessons learned from food assistance programs with regions and communities of practice; develop and contribute to agency knowledge databases and technical libraries.
• Lead in the development of the country fundraising strategy for the food security and livelihood sectors.
• Develop appropriate targeting criteria and mechanisms to ensure the needs of identified vulnerable groups are met.
• Monitor the agricultural and food security situation in Haiti and identify priority areas for agricultural emergency and resilience interventions.
• Help ensure a cross-sectoral approach integrating gender, protection mainstreaming, and disaster risk reduction.
• Participate in the design and review of large, complex, strategic and/or multi-country projects as needed.

INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL COORDINATION

• Contribute to program visibility and advocacy work by assisting in the dissemination of program research and learning information. Represent Mercy Corps in forums with the broader humanitarian and development community.
• Active contributor and collaborator with regional and global counterparts to promote best practices.

SECURITY

• Work closely with the country team’s security focal point to develop and maintain systems that promote the safety and security of all team members.
• Ensure that programs are designed and implemented with a clear analysis and understanding of security.

Supervisory Responsibility

Dotted-line technical supervision of program staff in the field offices (including capacity building).

Accountability

• Reports Directly To: Director of Programs
• Works Directly With: Deputy Director of Programs for Emergencies, Program Managers, Heads of Offices, Senior WASH Advisor (TSU), Operations, Finance
• Collaborates With: All MC Program Teams as needed

Accountability to Participants and Stakeholders

Mercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our program participants, community partners, other stakeholders, and to international standards guiding international relief and development work. We are committed to actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

Minimum Qualifications and Transferable Skills

• Master’s degree or equivalent experience in food security, nutrition, public health, development studies, social sciences, food security or other relevant field.
• Minimum 5 years of experience implementing Food Security projects in humanitarian and/or protracted crisis contexts (designing and conducting household socio-economic vulnerability analyses, food security and market-based programming, Emergency Food assistance, Cash and Voucher assistance….). Experience in both emergency and development contexts is preferred.
• At least five years of international development experience in food security, in management and/or advisory roles demonstrating progressive levels of responsibility, and including program work in several developing countries, and in more than one region.
• Knowledge of agricultural market systems development, with experience leading agribusiness, food security, or private sector/enterprise development.
• Demonstrated experience developing and ensuring quality control for technically rigorous food security integration and collaboration.
• Experience with quantitative and qualitative research methods and conducting field-based assessments required, training in statistical methods preferred.
• Experience conducting nutrition analyses/assessments and trainings preferred.
• Confirmed experience with the design of food basket and nutrition values
• Experience with market assessment and response analysis.
• Knowledge of technical principles, concepts, indicators and international standards on Food Security in humanitarian response. General knowledge of other related disciplines to ensure proper cross-sectoral approach.
• Experience from complex and complicated settings with time sensitive deliverables in unstable environments.
• Project design and implementation experience in core food security sectors: Agriculture, Nutrition, Natural Resource Management, Community Resiliency, Disaster Preparedness.
• Demonstrated ability to work and communicate effectively with an ethnically diverse team in a sensitive environment.
• Demonstrated flexibility and creativity in planning and problem solving.
• Experience with the development, implementation & compliance of USAID (BHA) and ECHO programs.
• Advanced level French and English (both preferred), Creole a plus.
• Previous experience in similar contexts.

Success Factors

The successful candidate will combine exceptional technical skills and experience in maintaining donor and partner relationships. S/he will have previous experience in working in large-scale emergency programs in insecure and conflict context. They will have an outstanding ability to design and provide technical oversight of innovative programs within the current and future program structure of Mercy Corps in the area. They will also have proven experience with cross-cultural team and capacity building, individual staff development and strong mentoring skills. The successful candidate will be able to provide technical oversight to large relief programs in an austere environment; be focused on capacity building of national staff; have strong program support skills, good information management skills and maintain a sense of humor.

Living Conditions / Environmental Conditions

The position is based in Miragoane. Although infrastructure is relatively poor in the location, comfortable housing with water and electricity are readily available. There are places to eat in all price ranges, as well as shops, and supermarkets which are comparable to a US supermarket. This position requires 30% of travel by car to other field offices in insecure environments.

Ongoing Learning

In support of our belief that learning organizations are more effective, efficient and relevant to the communities we serve, we empower all team members to dedicate 5% of their time to learning activities that further their personal and/or professional growth and development

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Achieving our mission begins with how we build our team and work together. Through our commitment to enriching our organization with people of different origins, beliefs, backgrounds, and ways of thinking, we are better able to leverage the collective power of our teams and solve the world’s most complex challenges. We strive for a culture of trust and respect, where everyone contributes their perspectives and authentic selves, reaches their potential as individuals and teams, and collaborates to do the best work of their lives.

We recognize that diversity and inclusion is a journey, and we are committed to learning, listening and evolving to become more diverse, equitable and inclusive than we are today.

Equal Employment Opportunity

Mercy Corps is an equal opportunity employer that does not tolerate discrimination on any basis. We actively seek out diverse backgrounds, perspectives, and skills so that we can be collectively stronger and have sustained global impact.

We are committed to providing an environment of respect and psychological safety where equal employment opportunities are available to all. We do not engage in or tolerate discrimination on the basis of race, color, gender identity, gender expression, religion, age, sexual orientation, national or ethnic origin, disability (including HIV/AIDS status), marital status, military veteran status or any other protected group in the locations where we work.

Safeguarding & Ethics

Mercy Corps is committed to ensuring that all individuals we come into contact with through our work, whether team members, community members, program participants or others, are treated with respect and dignity. We are committed to the core principles regarding prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse laid out by the UN Secretary General and IASC and have signed on to the Interagency Misconduct Disclosure Scheme. We will not tolerate child abuse, sexual exploitation, abuse, or harassment by or of our team members. As part of our commitment to a safe and inclusive work environment, team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner, respect local laws and customs, and to adhere to Mercy Corps Code of Conduct Policies and values at all times. Team members are required to complete mandatory Code of Conduct elearning courses upon hire and on an annual basis.