Consultant - Nigeria Program Engagements - Nigeria

Background:

Mercy Corps is a leading global organization powered by the belief that a better world is possible. In disaster, in hardship, in more than 40 countries around the world, we partner to put bold solutions into action — helping people triumph over adversity and build stronger communities from within.

ADF II Overview

Mercy Corps’ AgriFin Digital Farmer (ADF II) program will work to reach five million smallholder farmers across Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia, and Nigeria - 40% of whom are women - living on less than $2.00 per day, who will utilize DFS and/or DIS as a result of this project. In partnership with Bill and Melinda Gates and Bayer Foundations, ADF 2 seeks to support the expansion of digitally enabled services to 5 million smallholder farmers, delivered by growing ecosystems of diverse service providers and building farmer income, productivity and resilience across by 50% while reaching 40% women.  ADF II will continue to target farmers who work across a wide variety of crop, livestock and fish value chains, most of whom have diversified production systems growing multiple crops for both home consumption and sale. The program is expected to have positive impacts for farmers and direct partners providing services to farmers and ecosystem actors adopting learnings from program activities. Results and learning from this body of work can be found on the www.mercycorpsagrifin.org website.

GIZ DAA Overview

Drawing on Mercy Corps’ experience implementing the AgriFin Mobile, AgriFin Accelerate and AgriFin Digital Farmer programs, GIZ has engaged Mercy Corps to understand how young technology innovators can be supported in scale and operational viability by engaging with emerging models of digital platforms. The GIZ smart development hack is a six-month, €1,300,000 initiative to work with cohort of partners in Kenya and Nigeria to develop digital solutions that address challenges in the agriculture sector especially brought about by the Covid 19 pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic has drawn attention to the complex fragility of many countries, highlighted most clearly in the interplay of public health, markets and food systems. Early warning signs are emerging that the continent is on the brink of an unprecedented food security crisis. In Kenya it is estimated that there are sufficient strategic reserves for three months, but disrupted food systems, logistics and evidence of food hoarding may shorten that timeline, particularly as the largest desert locust invasion in 70 years. This project aims to promote zero contact and prevent the spread of COVID-19 by utilizing technology to expand access to food, improve distribution of agriculture outputs by consumers through support farmers utilize updated agriculture extension information to bolster production, cultivation, marketing and distribution of food in Kenya. Sprout, The Open Content Agriculture Platform, a project of Mercy Corps Agrifin (MCA), is partnering with KALRO to provide a content marketplace/exchange for expert content developers to offer high quality digital-ready, farmer-friendly content that can be used free of charge by content distribution partners. The goal of Sprout is to enable MCA partners to cost effectively, acquire and use this content is to build productivity, earned income and resilience of farmers at scale.

Purpose / Project Description:

AgriFin Digital Farmer I has been operating in Nigeria for over two years. Partners are at various stages of product development for Digital Financial Services (DFS) and Digital Information services (DIS) to smallholder farmers, with an on-the-ground person supporting the Agrifin team based in Nairobi, Kenya, in the engagement and follow-up of partners in-country under ADF II. The consultant will be required to advance Nigeria based partnership relationships, while supporting the Nairobi based technical team in successful implementation and evaluation of ADF engagements. This will include designing engagements, developing new/existing partnerships and facilitating product development initiatives that meet the strategic needs of our core partners.

In addition, under the GIZ DAA grant, the consultant will support with the Agrifin Sprout Nigeria Platform expansion, by identifying potential content contributors, content users and Farming Facing Organizations, participating in weekly Sprout Business Development meetings, onboarding new partners from Nigeria into the Sprout Platform, and updating and Sprout Business Development Pipeline.

Consultant Activities:

The consultant will engage with the AgriFin team across the following key activities:

• Support strong partner relationships, project plans and product roadmaps.
• Assist and in some cases lead the development of partner business and work plans, reviewing research, marketing plans, business processes, operational manuals, product and technology specifications, and financial statements to do so.
• Perform tasks based on project plans, those agreed with ADF II management, and those assigned by program management.
• Monitor project progress, with regular oversight of technical consultants or third-party providers, report and resolve, or assist in resolving issues, under direction of ADF II management
• Prepare project progress reports and status updates.
• Conduct due diligence on prospective partners, compile required legal documents and share reports on the same.
• Keep up to date with the Nigerian agri/fintech ecosystems and participate ongoing learning meetings with program stakeholders related to program focus areas, working in coordination with technical team managers.
• Assist the program in identifying technical consultants as needed, in preparing terms of reference and scopes of work, and provide support and oversight for consultants as required.
• Contribute to the Agrifin learning agenda and track partner impact metrics as and when required.
• Support on the Sprout platform and identification of new AgriFin opportunities in Nigeria and partnerships, and other requests provided by the task manager

Consultant Deliverables:

The consultant will work to produce the following deliverables, in close collaboration with the AgriFin Digital Banking lead:

1. Partner Prospecting and Project Development: Continue to support partner identification efforts and project development including participating in due diligence exercises, populating partner proposals and participation in pipeline update meetings. A monthly report accounting for activities done and time sheet.
2. Project implementation and partner relationship management: Support implementation of identified projects including kick off meetings, internal update meetings and regular updates with the partner and vendors to ensure project success. A monthly report accounting for activities outlined and time sheet. This is for all approved projects and upcoming projects for upcoming partners.
3. Project and program learning and reporting: Support when required, end of project and program reporting including documenting lessons learnt and achievements of projects under the advisory of the consultant, support program learning initiatives both internal and external where scheduled. A monthly report specifying support provided to project and program reporting and timesheet. This will also include support for research activities under the ongoing initiative funded by the Gates Foundation and collaboration with development organizations including CGAP.

Under GIZ DAA, more specific

1. Support Nigeria-based engagement deliverables based on AgriFin existing proposals and deliverables contracted through those documents
2. Support with Sprout Nigeria Platform expansion, by identifying potential content contributors, content users and Farming Facing Organizations, participating in weekly Sprout Business Development meetings, onboarding new partners from Nigeria into the Sprout Platform and updating and Sprout Business Development Pipeline.

Payments will be made based on days capped at worked with a maximum number of 30 days within the period of May 15, 2023 to November 15, 2023.

Timeframe / Schedule:

The Timeframe will be between May 15, 2023 and November 15, 2023.

The Consultant will report to:

Task Manager: Senior Digital Banking Manager and Nigeria Lead.

Final sign-off on deliverables and invoices: Program Director

The Consultant will work closely with:

The Agrifin technical team

Required Experience & Skills:

The individual consultant must demonstrate significant experience and expertise in:

• 5-10 years of experience in a relevant technical field
• Deep experience with implementation of AgriFin climate programming in learning, processes and partner engagements;
• Deep understanding of the Nigeria Agricultural ecosystem;
• Deep experience with resource development in agriculture
• Demonstrated ability to work in a mentor/advisor capacity across multidisciplinary and multicultural teams to build capacity around application of bundled digital services to promote improved livelihoods of smallholder farmers in Nigeria;
• Demonstrated ability to develop high quality written strategy, synthesis and recommendations on the related subjects;
• Minimum educational qualification is a master’s degree in a related subject.

**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 OpportunityWe 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 & EthicsMercy Corps team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our stakeholders and to international standards guiding international relief and development work, while actively engaging communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects. Team members are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner and respect local laws, customs and MC's policies, procedures, and values at all times and in all in-country venues.