National Shea Commodity Platform Manager

The forest ecosystems of Ghana’s Northern Savannah Zone (NSZ), an area of 9.7 million hectares with a population of over 5 million people, is characterized by nearly 400 million shea and other trees growing naturally on traditional farming systems. The trees are integrated with crops on smallholder farms, creating an agroforestry landscape resilient to climate change. These lands are facing a great threat with total forest cover having declined by over 77% between 2001-2015, with the conversion of 1,058,492 million hectares (ha) of woodlands to grasslands, croplands and degraded forests. This has resulted in Greenhouse Gas (GhG) emissions of an estimated 3.568 mtCO2e per annum. The main drivers of this deforestation and forest degradation are mid to late dry-season fires, conversion to agriculture, and cutting for timber and wood fuels.

The loss and degradation of woodlands and forests, including valuable trees like shea and other species, pose significant environmental, social and economic risks in the NSZ. Shea landscapes are important sources of carbon storage and sequestration above ground and in soils and roots. Shea is an ancient crop, consumed as an edible oil. The loss of shea trees impacts women because it provides a major source of economic livelihood to women in the region. They collect shea fruits and process them into kernels for sale, increasing the household income and promoting women’s involvement in the international marketplace and their empowerment. 

If community and forest reserves are managed sustainably and shea is restored in the landscape, a host of economic, environmental and social benefits will accrue over the long term to the population in the Northern Savannah Zone.

The project has four interrelated outputs that will be implemented through a cross-sectoral, comprehensive and holistic approach, driven by communities, women’s groups, the private sector and government institutions:

Output 1: Off-reserve, degraded, savannah woodlands and forests restored under self-financing community management in CREMA.

Output 2: Degraded shea parklands restored through public-private partnerships.

Output 3 Modified Taungya System plantations and fire management in forest reserves

Output 4: Integrated monitoring system implemented, and REDD+ Systems strengthened

These Terms of Reference focuses on the management and coordination of the stakeholders involved in the shea value chain. The partners on the GSLERP (UNDP, Forestry Commission and Global Shea Alliance) have agreed to set up a national shea sector multi-stakeholder platform as the mechanism to get a more concerted approach amongst the relevant stakeholders to developing and sustaining the Shea industry.

This position seeks to employ a professional to lead the formation and management of the national shea multi-stakeholder platform.

a. Ensure effective planning, budgeting, and management of the platform through the following tasks: 

• Prepare and deliver project work plans, budgets, troubelshoot any issues that may arise, and carry out monitoring through the implementation of the project; 
• Prepare project reports in line with the standard template in a timely manner;
• Oversee budget utilization, prepare and submit financial reports to the Forestry Commission and the UNDP; 
• Ensure gender-related economic, environmental public research and analysis, to contribute to the formulation of policies, procedures, guidelines and tools that will hold the platform together.

b. Oversee, coordinate, and facilitate the establishment and implementation of the National Shea Multi-Stakeholder Platform and ensure effective implementation and achievement through the below activities:

• Provide technical expertise on the day-to-day multi-stakeholder coordination process and ensure the achievement of targets as outlined in the project work plan;
• Deliver conferences and workshops in collaboration with multiple stakeholders;
• Facilitate and prepare the content for the multi-stakeholder process, meetings, and workshops;
• Lead and supervise all communication with members on the platform;
• Oversee the day-to-day coordination with platform members and ensure the achievement of targets as outlined in the project work plan;
• Performs oversight roles for platform compliance against the relevant government policy and regulations;
• Develop and strengthen relationships with key actors in the shea sector and foster their participation in the national platform;
• Manage the multi-stakeholder dialogue process to develop, implement and monitor collective action plans and commitments.

c. Create and nurture strategic partnerships and support to the implementation of resource mobilization:

• Establish and maintain good working with the Forestry Commission, the Global Shea Alliance, and other relevant public and development partners; 
• Lead efforts to ensure the creation and coordination of partnerships with development partners, government institutions, the private sector, civil society etc., including efforts to determine programmatic areas of cooperation; 
• Identify opportunities for mobilizing resources for the project and prepare substantive briefs on possible areas of cooperation; 
• Ensure the visibility of the project in coordination with UNDP’s Communication unit and other relevant counterparts’ communications departments.

d. Facilitate knowledge building and management for and from the platform’s implementation:

• Identify best practices and lessons learnt from the development and management of the platform and from other initiatives;
• Lead in generating knowledge products such as best practices and lessons learnt for knowledge sharing; 
• Contribute to knowledge networks and communities of practice;
• Manage and provide input to platform-related learning and evaluation activities. 

The incumbent of the position should avoid any kind of discriminatory behavior including gender discrimination, and ensure that:

• Human rights and gender equality is prioritized as an ethical principle within all actions;
• Activities are designed and implemented in accordance with the “Social and Environmental Standards of UNDP”; 
• Any kind of diversities based on ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, disability, religion, class, and gender are respected within all implementations, including data production;
• Differentiated needs of women and men are considered;
• An inclusive approach is reflected within all actions and implementations, in that sense an enabling and accessible setup in various senses such as disability gender language barrier is created;
• Necessary arrangements to provide gender parity within all committees, meetings, trainings etc.

The incumbent performs other duties within their functional profile as deemed necessary for the efficient functioning of the Office and the Organization.