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Consultancy Opportunity: Natural Resources Management, Agriculture and Environment

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CGIAR Independent Science and Partnership Council (ISPC) Secretariat
Location: Rome
Last Date: October 18, 2010

Consultancy Opportunity: 

Natural Resources Management, Agriculture and Environment

Based at the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, Rome 11 months contract

The CGIAR Independent Science and Partnership Council (ISPC) Secretariat is looking for a consultant to work in the area of Natural Resources Management, Agriculture and Environment for a period of 11 months (ideally 1st November 2010 to 30th September 2011). 

Background

The Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) is an international agricultural research system working towards a common vision: to reduce poverty and hunger, improve human health and nutrition, and enhance ecosystem resilience through high-quality international agricultural research, partnership and leadership.

The Independent Science and Partnership Council (ISPC) currently has a mandate in the CGIAR for three areas of strategic importance to the CGIAR system as a whole:

  • Foresight studies: To examine issues of strategic importance to the future of the CGIAR system as a whole, and provide advice on likely implications for the direction of agricultural research
  • Mobilizing science: To enhance the quality, relevance and impact of science and to mobilize the global scientific community towards the mission and goals of the CGIAR.
  • Impact assessment: To provide CGIAR members with timely, objective and credible information on the impacts at the system level of past CGIAR investments and outputs in terms of the CGIAR goals, and to feed this information back into CGIAR priority-setting

 In 2010/11, one foresight study will examine the state of NRM research in the CGIAR and the factors affecting impact at scale in the future. 

In 2011, the ISPC is planning to hold a second Science Forum 1 which will focus on a range of issues related to the agriculture-environment nexus (such as: input use efficiency; land-saving from increases in agricultural productivity; low carbon agriculture; peak phosphorous; climate change adaptation; biodiverse farming systems). It is hoped that this agenda will engage the large number of environmental Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) that increasingly have an interest in agriculture but that have not been traditional partners of the CGIAR. 

Terms of Reference 

Reporting to the Executive Director of the CGIAR Independent Science and Partnership Council (ISPC) Secretariat, and in collaboration with members of the ISPC and Secretariat colleagues, the consultant will provide technical support to the Foresight and Mobilizing Science portfolios of the ISPC as follows. 

1) Manage a survey of NRM activities in the CGIAR (December 2010 – March 2011)

The aims of this activity are to get an external view on how the CGIAR system is performing in NRM research, and to highlight some of the contrasts within the CGIAR system on the perspectives of what NRM is and how it was to achieve impacts at scale 2.

The consultant will bring together a small panel of centre scientists and independent specialists to help design the survey and analyse the results, and then to advise the ISPC on whether a more comprehensive, deeper study (featuring visits to CGIAR centres, field site visits) is merited. 

2) Write a background paper on NRM for the Science Forum (April – June 2011)

Based partly on the experience gained in carrying out the survey in 1), and partly from reviews of the wider literature and drawing on previous professional experience where possible, the consultant is expected to work with ISPC members in drafting a paper on the topic: “Challenges to achieving impact from CGIAR NRM research”. This paper should critically examine the theoretical basis for the impact pathways (either implicit or explicitly stated) for a range of NRM research outputs and examine where assumptions regarding adoption, scale or trade-offs among competing objectives have limited the possibility for CGIAR NRM research to have an impact on CGIAR goals. 

3) Contribute to the organisation of the Science Forum 2011 (tasks throughout period of consultancy)

The date and venue of the Science Forum is to be determined but tasks will run throughout the period leading up to the forum and beyond it (communicating the outcomes):

  • Providing technical input to the development of background papers for the forum
  • Researching and proactively contacting some key people to invite from the academic and NGO communities, discuss their main strategic interests in these areas for possible inclusion in the forum  
  • Attending the forum, contributing to reporting of sessions, and to a final report / special issue of a journal3
  • Other duties as required, in collaboration with ISPC members and secretariat colleagues  

Person Specification 

  • Advanced university degree (MSc or Ph.D) in a discipline related to natural resource management
  • Five years of relevant experience in environmental science / ecology or agricultural development in less developed countries with particular emphasis on the relationship between agriculture and environment  
  • Demonstrated ability to write clear and concise reports
  • Experience of organising large events involving participants from multiple countries
  • Excellent knowledge of English
  • Excellent IT skills
  • Working knowledge of a second UN language is desirable  

Instructions for applicants 

Interested parties should send the following to the address below, to be received not later than 23.59 hrs (Rome time, GMT +2 hrs) 18th October 2010 

  • Personal History Form, found on the Internet site at:  http://www.fao.org/VA/adm11e.dot 
  • cover note explaining how your experience enables you to successfully fulfil these terms of reference
  • names and contact details for three people willing to provide references

 Candidates should be ready to participate in interviews by video link (Skype preferred) in the week beginning 25th October 

Email (preferred): muriel.pougheon@fao.org 

Post: Ms Muriel Pougheon, Room C-630, FAO, Via delle Terme di Caracalla 00153, Rome, Italy

 Fax: +39 06 570 53298

 1 In 2009, the ISPC (in collaboration with the CGIAR Secretariat at the World Bank, the Alliance of the CGIAR Centers, the Global Forum on Agricultural Research, and Wageningen University and Research Centre) organised a Science Forum1 that cut across a number of important issues for the future of agricultural research and brought together more than 300 participants from 55 countries.  

2 Equivalent to that recently undertaken in the Stripe Review of Social Sciences:  http://www.sciencecouncil.cgiar.org/fileadmin/user_upload/sciencecouncil/Systemwide_and_Ecoregional_Programs/SSSR_for_web.pdf

3 A special issue of the journal Crop Science was published to feature the major contributions  http://www.sciencecouncil.cgiar.org/fileadmin/user_upload/sciencecouncil/Reports/CROP_SCIENCE_FOR_WEB.pdf

 

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