Chief Operations Officer Community Climate Solutions Zambia Limited

Background Community Climate Solutions

Community Climate Solutions is a start-up focused on developing holistic and trusted carbon offset projects that benefit both the climate as well as the rural subsistence farmers. Headquartered in Zug and Lusaka, we have a team of over 30 people and are growing rapidly, with the majority of staff permanently residing in and serving over 100’000 farmers in Zambia.

Our carbon capture model is to empower rural subsistence farmers to reduce and remove carbon emissions from their own agricultural land and its surroundings. Our interventions are centered on (i) reducing uncontrolled bush fires and (ii) restoring the Miombo ecosystem, all by equipping and incentivizing the individual farmers. These activities increase carbon storage, which we monetize on behalf of the farmers using the voluntary carbon market. Executed with our social mind set and mission, this allows us to multiply the farmers income and drastically reduce severe poverty.

Our differentiating factors are (i) focusing on direct household payment, with farmers getting paid for the amount of carbon they remove on their own fields and surrounding areas, enabling them to become self-motivated eCO2preneurs. (ii) Our projects are embedded in an existing and expanding ecosystem comprising vocational education facilities, a microfinance institution and an affordable housing provider, which ensure community payouts are multiplied and invested for generations.

Job Description

• We are now looking to hire a COO, with the following responsibilities:
• Supporting the CEO Zambia in leading Community Climate Solutions Zambia by assuming responsibility for CCSZ’s operations, including HR, procurement, security, etc. in close co-ordination with the finance manager
• Leading and coordinating the project staff permanently located in our 5 project areas
• Leading the co-operation with and roll-out of Community Forest Management Groups (CFMGs) across the 5 project areas
• Coordinating and tracking the roll-out of the above-mentioned initiatives to >100’000 rural farming households and several million hectares
• Managing procurement and distribution of material required by staff and communities

Job Requirements

Please only apply if you fulfill the following requirements:

• Significant experience in managing and scaling operations in rural Zambia
• Strong leadership, supervisory skills and strong strategic thinking capabilities as well as ability to conceptualize, implement and standardize operational processes
• Highest levels of personal integrity and honesty and excellent communications- and team building skills
• At least 10 years of experience in operational leadership roles, including experience as a COO
• Degree in business, finance, project management or related field
• Conceptual thinking coupled with a hands-on attitude (“let me take care of it”)