Senior Associate, Accountability Framework initiative

ABOUT THE ACCOUNTABILITY FRAMEWORK INITIATIVE

The Accountability Framework initiative (AFi) is a collaborative effort to bring about a “new normal” of responsible supply chains that are protective of forests, other natural ecosystems, and human rights. It is led by a diverse coalition of 23 environmental and human rights NGOs from around the world. The AFi’s work addresses key commodities that are major drivers of deforestation and social impacts, such as palm oil, soy, rubber, cocoa, timber, wood pulp, beef, and leather.

Rainforest Alliance leads the secretariat (“Backbone Team”) for this initiative, providing strategy development, technical support, stakeholder engagement, communications, coordination, and administration to support the work of the AFi and its partners around the world. For more information, please visit: https://accountability-framework.org.

POSITION SUMMARY:

We are looking for a motivated, impact-driven professional to join the AFi Backbone Team and contribute to our mission of scaling-up responsible agricultural and forestry supply chains that create positive impacts for people and nature. The ideal candidate will be strategic and goal-oriented with strong analytical, organizational, and research skills, as well as an acute attention to detail. This individual will be able to collaborate effectively with colleagues from diverse organizations and cultural backgrounds while prioritizing tasks, maintaining focus, and taking initiative to learn new skills in a dynamic working environment.

This position contributes to the AFi’s success through the development and implementation of effective systems for knowledge management, monitoring, and evaluation. The Senior Associate will ensure these systems provide a clear and effective means of tracking and measuring progress against AFi’s goals. They will also be responsible for analysing information and communicating insights to the AFi Backbone Team, the AFi Coalition, and other key stakeholders to continuously improve our program and its impacts.

The Senior Associate will also conduct and support research on a range of topics within the AFi’s scope and integrate research findings into the AFi’s company-facing guidelines, resources, and other communications. The Senior Associate will also represent the AFi at events and forums as necessary. This role will work closely with the AFI’s Senior Operations Manager and the communications team to ensure that findings and insights from the knowledge management system and research and seamlessly integrated into the AFi’s public-facing outputs.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

The Senior Associate will contribute to the work of the AFi Backbone Team in the following three main areas.

Knowledge management (KM) and strategic insights

• Ensure effective management and regular updating of AFi’s KM system to enable tracking of Framework adoption by companies and other key user groups;
• Develop effective tracking mechanisms to measure progress against annual workplans and donor requirements, and support the compilation of progress reports for donors and the AFi Coalition;
• Develop strategic insights and analyses from the KM system and bring these insights into regular team meetings and decision-making processes;
• Update and innovate AFi’s approaches to KM and monitoring and evaluation, including annual updating of the AFi KM strategy;
• Support engagements with industry associations, peer sustainability initiatives, and policy makers to capture uptake of the Accountability Framework in their policies, standards, or systems;
• Support the AFi communications team to integrate insights and findings from the KM system into communications resources and materials;

Research and analysis related to key forest-risk commodity sectors

• Conduct research and analysis on trends in supply chain sustainability to support the development of new Accountability Framework materials and inform priorities and strategies for Framework implementation;
• Support the development and updating of company profiles to help define objectives and engagement tactics driving adoption of the Accountability Framework by high priority companies;
• Collect and synthesize feedback from Accountability Framework users to identify ways to improve the Framework and its value to users;

Support the management of the AFi and its Coalition

• Support the Senior Operations Manager to manage project grants, contracts, and partnerships;
• Support stakeholder consultations on draft Framework materials with companies, NGOs, and other organizations as/when needed; and
• Other duties as assigned.

QUALIFICATIONS:

• Bachelor’s degree in a sustainability-related field, such as agriculture, forestry, international development, social sciences, economics, or ecology;
• Strong understanding of sustainability issues related to commodity supply chains, including land use and governance, climate change mitigation, and human rights and livelihoods;
• Experience in knowledge management and monitoring and evaluation strongly desired;
• Superior English speaking, writing, and presentation skills;
• Willingness to travel domestically and internationally up to 10 -15% of the time;
• Work experience in tropical developing countries is a plus but not required;
• Proficiency in Bahasa Indonesia, French, Portuguese, or Spanish is a plus.

Deadline: 10 January 2025

Notes:

• Only candidates authorized to work in the Netherlands or the UK will be considered.
• It is possible for this to be a fully remote role.

If you have any questions about the job vacancy, please contact the HR department: recruitment@ra.org

The Rainforest Alliance encourages diversity and inclusion across the global organization. With this commitment to diversity, we are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and do not discriminate on the basis of gender, race, color, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, ages, disability and any other protected group.