Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist Self Help Africa

Organisational Strategy:

Self Help Africa’s Zambia programme works with local communities to help them improve their livelihoods. Our mission is to alleviate hunger, poverty, social inequality and the impact of climate change through community-led, market-based and enterprise-focused approaches, so that people have access to safe, nutritious and affordable food throughout the year.

Self Help Africa has been working in Zambia for over 35 years and has reached over 250,000 smallholder farmers. Our work has been focused on ending poverty and hunger through community-led and market-based approaches. Our experience working with rural communities and smallholder farmers during this time has honed our expertise in addressing climate change and its impact on food production and the environment.

While our core work is with small-scale farming families, who make up the majority (70 per cent) of the extremely poor in Zambia, we also implement projects that support communities facing grave humanitarian crises, and we assist farmers and farming cooperatives in sourcing profitable markets locally, nationally and regionally for their produce.

We collaborate with companies – both large and small – seeking to create jobs, add value, and develop markets that enable small-holder farmers to trade their goods. We also seek relationships with international businesses and corporations seeking opportunities to invest, collaborate, and develop markets that contribute to economic growth in Zambia.

Project Background:

Self Help Africa is anticipating starting implementing a project funded under the Global Environment Facility (GEF) in the Central and Southern Provinces of Zambia. The project focus is on environmental restoration, climate change and biodiversity conservation. The Climate-resilient ecosystem restoration and sustainable land management in the Central and Southern Provinces of Zambia project will address the barriers to sustainable land management and biodiversity conservation at six project sites in two provinces (Central and Southern Province).

The project has four components. Component one will support the development of an enabling environment for climate change adaptation that will also support reduced ecosystem degradation and strengthened biodiversity. Component two will focus on restoring the ecological integrity of the degraded natural environment in the proposed project sites, mainly riding on the provisions of natural resources and environmental management, land management, water resources management, agriculture, and climate change frameworks. Component three is focused on promoting Gender-responsive, climate-resilient natural resource-based livelihoods. It will aim to support sustainable agricultural production practices that will reduce the negative impacts associated with bad livelihood practices, such as charcoal production and unsustainable agricultural practices. Component four will focus on Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning ensuring that lessons and learning from the project are captured, developed, reported and disseminated to relevant stakeholders.

The Project will generate global environmental benefits and contribute substantially to revenue generation, employment and sustainable rural livelihoods

Job Purpose:

The Monitoring & Evaluation Specialist will advise the Project Manager in planning, implementation and reporting of monitoring, evaluation and learning related activities of our anticipated GEF funded grant. S/He will contribute to the development of programme related M&E systems, tracking performance indicators, development of data collection tools, data collection, analysis and reporting, drafting of learning papers and thought leadership papers. Independently manages surveys through SHA specific methodologies and tools. Provides accurate analysis and presentation of information to enhance SHA’s position as a strong development partner. S/He is the overall technical lead for the implementation of all project outputs and activities and ensure technical soundness of project implementation.

Key Responsibilities:

• Ensure planning and implementation focusing on overall M&E framework of the project
• Ensure effective and efficient implementation of the project’s Monitoring and Evaluation plan including periodically reviewing the M&E plan to ensure it is fit for purpose. Ensures planning and implementation focusing on overall M&E framework of the project
• Develop measurement methods and identify data sources for project performance and impact indicators in conjunction with the Monitoring & Evaluation Advisor and project team
• Provide quality assurance through the development and implementation of SHA’s M&E system
• Ensure that project data are entered and updated on a timely basis by all responsible officers
• Work as a team member of the Project Implementation Unit and with all project partners to monitor and evaluate project activities, outputs and outcomes
• Work with data collection partners and motivate, lead, and set objectives
• Develop and manage monitoring work plans and the monitoring budget.
• Oversee the collection of field data by project partners.
• Oversee local-to-global GIS and other enterprise-scale spatial and relational databases.
• Ensure the integrity of data collection and management related to project progress reporting.
• Input the data into the monitoring database, analyse the monitoring data, find the explanation for variations in the data
• Produce quarterly monitoring reports, provide summary reports on progress towards targets, and update progress in the project’s progress tracking system
• Document success stories and lessons learned from project work and share these with donors and partners.
• Organize and support data collection for project evaluations and assess and use relevant methodologies for the measurement of conservation and resilience indicators

OTHER

• Any other duties as assigned by the Project Manager.

Qualifications/ Experience and Other Requirements:

• Master’s degree in social science in a relevant field, preferably in project management or development planning.

Other Requirements:

• An academic degree in natural resources management would be an added advantage.
• At least five (5) years of experience in monitoring and evaluation, results-based management.
• Act independently under limited supervision, resolve complex issues within the program area, and be a resource to others.
• Experience managing and supervising data collection.
• Sound knowledge of Zambia’s development planning process and development
  plans.
• Experience in interpretation of data.
• Experience in donor reporting requirements.
• Experience writing project progress reports.
• Experience collaborating with other parties to obtain data.
• Experience working within Development agencies, preferably in the government system
• Knowledge of GIS.
• Self-motivated and able to work remotely with minimum supervision.

Role Competencies:

• Results-oriented with excellent organisational and communication skills, as well as enthusiasm and initiative
• Proactive and motivated with a strong commitment to Self Help Africa’s vision, mission and values
• Able to prioritise, plan and coordinate work remotely and with various partners.
• Attention to detail and the ability to produce timely and accurate reports
• Ability to work as part of team across different cultures
• Ability to work under pressure and on own initiative
• Excellent oral, written, mass and interpersonal communication skills.