Heifer International is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, status as a protected veteran, among other things, or status as a qualified individual with some form of specially-abled**.**
FUNCTION:
The Program Officer- Access to Finance will lead Heifer’s project activities on connecting producer owned cooperatives and self-help groups with financial institutions. S/he will lead development and execution of the overall strategic vision, goal and objectives of the access to finance component.
RESPONSIBILITIES AND DELIVERABLES**: (**including approximate percentage effort)
Enterprise Development (30%):
- Formulate the enterprise development strategy for signature programs.
- Implement policies, procedures, systems and tools for enterprise development in alignment with Heifer’s signature program strategy.
- Facilitate enterprise development activities for self-help group (SHG) members, community agro-vet entrepreneurs (CAVEs), cooperatives and value chain actors.
- Map the value chain actors, flow of information and products, infrastructure, financial institutions to help strengthen the enterprises.
- Deliver capacity building activities in the areas of agribusiness, value chain and market development.
- Monitor, support and backstop the various categories of enterprises for effective functioning.
- Prepare manuals, briefs, guidelines, technical papers and information, education, and communication (IEC) materials related to Access to Finance (A2F) and enterprise development.
Marketing & Branding (30%):
- Implement policies, procedures and systems for market development in alignment with Heifer’s signature program strategy (including operational guidelines for collection center, transport vehicles, etc.).
- Share internal intelligence and knowledge on business development issues and trends within the livestock sector.
- Contribute to corporate and sector marketing plans, prepare donor strategies, and contribute to branding of commodities among stakeholders.
- Connect cooperatives to the end market for sale of products.
- Facilitate multi-stakeholder consultation meetings, workshops, and business-to-business meetings for better market linkages.
- Facilitate functional relationships with value chain and market actors to overcome bottlenecks in the market system.
Access to Finance (40%):
- Implement access to finance strategy for the signature program.
- Explore, assess, and identify appropriate financing providers and opportunities and float those opportunities to potential clients (individual/cooperative/corporates MSMEs).
- Collaborate with BFIs to develop, improve, and scale up appropriate financial products and services for all type of MSMEs.
- Assist bank staff in identifying potential clients (MSMEs) among the target groups and build a pipeline of loan deals.
- Expand access to risk mitigation products, such as agriculture/livestock insurance.
- Identify financial gaps among value chain actors.
- Engage the financial intermediaries such as banks and MFIs allocating capital for Heifer Programs.
- Facilitate the guarantees or underwriting of loans and debt/equity investment opportunities.
- Build a pipeline of potential impact venture opportunities.
- Facilitate the process of accessing potential impact investments.
- Support the MSMEs, cooperatives, producers and value chain actors to develop bankable business plans and connect with relevant financial and non-financial service providers.
- Facilitate the financial literacy and education of cooperatives and women and youth entrepreneurs
QUALIFICATIONS AND SKILLS:
- A Bachelor's Degree or equivalent from a recognized university in the fields of Agriculture Economics, Business Administration, Rural Development, Enterprise Development or other related field and a minimum of seven (7) years of field and technical experience with commercial sector, agribusiness development in a mix of economic growth/trade, value chain competitiveness, investment promotion, or agriculture development.
- Previous experience of target-based capital deployment from financial institutions to producer organizations.
- Clear understanding of the goat, vegetable, agri-product value chains.
- Innovative, analytical, and solutions oriented.
- Knowledge of enterprise development and linkages to poverty alleviation.
- Significant experience in building public/private partnerships.
- Experience working with farmer producer organization programs.
- Experience in the commercial sector with skills to develop and evaluate investment opportunities and promote such opportunities to financial institutions.
- Strong consumer marketing, financial analysis and management skills.
- Proven experience in building the capacity of partner institutions to document and disseminate industry information, manage knowledge, measure progress and plan and advocate within the industry.
- Track record of building strong client and stakeholder relationships.
- Ability to generate innovative solutions in work situations.
ESSENTIAL COMPETENCIES:
- Strong interpersonal/people management skills and excellent oral and written communication skills a must.
- Excellent organizational and leadership skills.
- Proficient knowledge of word processing, spreadsheets, presentation tools, electronic mail (Microsoft Office preferred) and internet.
- Demonstrated proficiency in Hindi, English and other local languages, both oral and written.
- Excellent command of report writing, analysis and presentation skills using Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
- Experience in supporting and monitoring field-based programs in the country.
- Ability to prepare and present documents in a well-designed and attractive format with superior attention to detail.
- Ability to understand, appreciate and implement Heifer’s Values-Based Holistic Community Development model.
- Demonstrated creativity, ability to think systematically, willingness and ability to incorporate innovative solutions.
- Willingness and ability to travel extensively throughout India.
- Ability to work with sensitive information and maintain confidentiality.
- Ability to manage and execute multiple tasks with little supervision while meeting sometimes inflexible deadlines.