Chief of Party – Food for Progress
Now Hiring: Chief of Party – Food for Progress (FFPr) 2025 Program
Are you a visionary leader passionate about transforming global agriculture and empowering communities? NCBA CLUSA is seeking a dynamic, experienced COP to spearhead the 2025 Food for Progress (FFPr) Program, a bold, multi-year initiative focused on modernizing and strengthening agricultural sectors across Africa, Asia, and South America.
Funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and expected to launch in November 2025, this high-impact program aims to enhance agricultural productivity and expand trade capacity in developing countries and emerging democracies. The COP will play a pivotal role in shaping and executing a strategy that will drive sustainable agricultural development over a 3- to 5-year period.
If you’re ready to lead a global team, forge powerful partnerships, and make a measurable difference in the lives of farmers and communities across three continents, we want to hear from you.
SCOPE AND PURPOSE:
The Chief of Party (COP) provides overall strategic, technical, and programmatic leadership for a project and serves as the key point of contact for the Food for Progress Program (FFPr) with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, implementing partners, and other key stakeholders. The position implements the project with high quality in accordance with NCBA CLUSA’s international program management standards and with its technical approach and principles. The COP will ensure that NCBA CLUSA’s values, methodology and approaches are being uniformly implemented throughout the project.
ESSENTIAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Provides overall technical vision, leadership, and oversees the design and implementation of project activities.
• Ensures team is able to draft and submit evaluation plans to meet baseline approval.
• Leads internal and external project planning and reporting, including annual work planning with partners and sub-recipients.
• Facilitates dialogue with all levels of government, including working at the district and community levels.
• Ensures the effective use and coordination of USDA resources and the compliance of the financial systems and controls with USDA and NCBA CLUSA standards.
• Ensures sound financial management including programmatic budgeting, spending projections, and monitoring of payments.
• Works closely with NCBA CLUSA Headquarters to ensure high-quality periodic reporting.
• Serves as the primary representative of the project to USDA, relevant government entities, partners, and other implementers and stakeholders.
• Ensures project cohesion among project staff, consortium partners and/or subcontractors.
• Manages, supervises, and builds capacity of all field staff, long‐term staff, short‐term staff, consortium partners, and/or sub‐contractors, as proposed.
• Develops and manages a multifaceted team to successfully co-create and implement a sustainable integrated design.
• Integrates community approaches and capacity building into all activities as appropriate.
QUALIFICATIONS:
To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty mentioned satisfactorily. The requirements listed above are representative of the knowledge, skills, and/or abilities required.
EDUCATION, SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE:
• A Master’s degree or equivalent in economics, trade policy, agriculture, food security, agribusiness, or related field.
• Bachelor’s Degree and 15 years of experience, Master’s degree and 12 years of experience, PhD and 8 years of experience, or equivalent combination of education and experience. Experience must include managing and leading projects, preferably in food security, agricultural production, trade facilitation, and logistics ($20M or more in size).
• Chief of Party/Country (Regional) Director or Program Manager experience strongly preferred.
• Demonstrated understanding of USDA rules and regulations.
• Knowledge of, and experience in, implementing agriculture solutions for increased productivity and experience in supply chain and sustainable sourcing of commodities preferred.
• Demonstrated ability to build, negotiate and maintain relationships with government counterparts in the cooperating country, USG donors, and other key stakeholders and partners.
• Ability to successfully recruit, train, build capacity, motivate, and manage staff, consortium partners, and/or sub-contractors.
• Prior experience in Food for Progress countries including Colombia, Kenya, Vietnam, Ghana and Ethiopia strongly preferred.
• Experience in supporting the drafting and submission of evaluation plans to meet baseline approval.
• Ability to negotiate and manage agreements and all required programmatic and financial reporting requirements.
• Possess a high level of emotional intelligence, tact, and diplomacy; able to model respect in the workplace and for partners.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills, including an engaging style for public presentations, and analytical, interpersonal, and cross-cultural skills.
Fluency in English is required. Fluency in a local language, such as Spanish, French, and/or Swahili is highly desired.
• Proficiency using MS Windows and MS Office products including Excel, Word, and PowerPoint, and Web Conferencing Applications.
For consideration, please email your CV and cover letter to rmerritt@ncba.coop with “COP FFPr” in the subject line.
DO NOT USE THE APPLY NOW BUTTON
Apply now