Leasehold Forestry Specialist at FAO

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, as implementing partner with the Department of Forest and Department of Livestock Services, of the project Technical Assistance for Leasehold Forest and Livestock Programme (GCP/NEP/062/FIN) is seeking consultancy services for the below subject areas.

• Leasehold Forestry Specialist

Under the overall guidance of the LFLP National Project Coordinator, and under the direct supervision of the Team Leader, the Leasehold Forestry Specialist will be responsible for the technical assistance component of the project (Forestry component) and for advising and assisting the government agencies in the overall implementation of the programme. The technical assistance project is under the overall framework of the Leasehold Forestry and Livestock Programme (LFLP) implemented jointly by Government of Nepal, IFAD and FAO. More specifically, the Specialist will carry out the following tasks:

• implement and update existing field guidelines and manuals on LFLP developed by TCP-LFLP;
• stratify the LFUGs as per the Criteria & Indicator developed by TCP-LFLP and develop mechanism for re-energizing the LFUGs and ensure proper service delivery;
• assist the specialist team / group in developing lopping and harvesting protocols of tree fodder, and other forest products in Leasehold Forestry;
• pilot and update Sustainable Forest Management Criteria & Indicator for Leasehold Forestry developed by TCP-LFLP;
• assist the M&E specialist to assess the effectiveness of Leasehold Forestry on poverty alleviation;
• assist the specialist team/group in assessing the value of environmental services provided by Leasehold Forestry, and in developing green accounting;
• assist the specialist team/group in exploring the potential of Leasehold Forestry in carbon trading and REDD;
• help integrate Leasehold Forestry into Community Forestry as per the recently approved CF operational guidelines in programme districts and provide feed back to the programme;
• review the roles and responsibilities of each of the institutions established in LFLP, assess their effectiveness and redefine their roles and responsibilities, where necessary;
• develop intra and inter-Departmental coordination and collaboration, and also with other agencies, local governments, CBOs, NGOs and donors for better integration and co- funding of LFLP activities;
• develop linkages and enhance partnership with other Projects and programmes for integrated planning, capacity building, entrepreneurship development, and infrastructure development;
• review the institutional structure and service providing mechanism of the line agencies and develop user friendly and cost effective service delivery mechanisms;
• expand Hub offices to 5, covering at least two or more districts or four to six clusters in the programme district, considering the distribution of LFUGs, their remoteness and workload;
• develop mechanism to integrate monitoring and evaluation function of the Regional Forest Directorate with Leasehold forestry; and
• support the LFLP in the above tasks and in any other duties related to LFLP activities as required by the LFLP Programme Coordinator and the Team Leader.

Qualifications and Experience: M.Sc. in forestry or natural resource management, with a minimum of seven years of experience in both at field and policy level, with a good understanding of leasehold forestry, community forestry, and good reporting and managerial skills.

Duty station: Kathmandu, with frequent travel in Programme Districts

Duration: 42 months

Working Language: English/Nepali

Interested persons should forward their applications along with an updated UN Personal History Form “PHF” in electronic format to the e-mail address [email protected] or by post to below address no later than on the 29 November 2009.

FAO Representative’s Office
P.O.Box 25, Kathmandu
UN House, Pulchowk, Lalitpur

IMPORTANT: All applicants are required to write GCP/NEP/062/FIN and the post to which they apply on the envelope or to the e-mail subject line. For example: “GCP/NEP/062/FIN Rural Finance Specialist”. Women and people from minority groups are especially encouraged to apply. Only short-listed candidates will be contacted. No telephone enquiry will be entertained.

Further information available at FAO website.