Company Profile

Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) is a United States-based non-profit organization dedicated to discovering, and promoting effective solutions to global poverty problems. IPA designs, rigorously evaluate and refines these solutions and their applications together with decision-makers to ensure that the evidence created is used to  improve opportunities for the world’s poor.

Job Description

Crop Cut Survey Field Staff, Disseminating Innovative Resources and Technologies to Smallholders (DIRTS)

• Reports to: Field Manager
• Location:  Tamale, Ghana
• Deadline to apply: 28^th July, 2016
• Duration: 4 months (maximum)
• Desired start date: 8^th August, 2016
• Job code: DIRTS/CEA-2016/02

Project Summary
The Disseminating Innovative Resources and Technologies to Smallholders (DIRTS) project is a follow up study on the Examining Underinvestment in Agriculture (EUI) project which was conducted from 2009-2012 by Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA), Ghana. The project explored questions on constraints to underinvestment in farming activities in Northern Ghana.

To achieve this study randomly assigned treatment on capital and/or weather-indexed insurance to selected farmers, and measured the impact of these treatments on agricultural investment decisions. The key outcome of this study was that access to insurance led to increased farmer investment in scale of production but not cultivation intensification.

DIRTS project hypothesizes that in addition to drought index insurance, access to extension services and a wide range of agricultural inputs will permit these farmers to adopt intensified cultivation practices and thus improve production and per-acre profitability.

We’re currently want to embark on a crop cutting survey which requires the services of field staff.

Field Supervisor Position Summary

• Report to Research Consultant
• Supervise multiple Surveyors and Team Leaders;
• Organize overall field logistics;
• Will be responsible for collecting all weighed cobs from field to designated location for drying
• Will supervise drying and weighing of maize cobs at a designated location.
• Will serve as link between field staff (surveyors, TLs) and Research Consultant.
• Accompany surveyors; conduct random spot checks; Scrutinize edited surveys; do back-checks as necessary;
• Ensure survey equipment is managed appropriately by field teams and assist with the preparation of daily work plans
• Perform other duties related to the project that may be assigned to him/her.

Required Skills or Experience

It is required that potential candidates possess;

• A university degree in Agriculture (Crop Science, Agronomy, Agribusiness, Agricultural Economics & Agricultural Extension), Statistics, Economics or any related field.
• Strong oral and written communication skills in English;
• Strong oral proficiency and basic grammatical knowledge of Dagbani and/or Konkonba/Likpakpa. Frafra preferable but not required.
• Good knowledge of basic mathematical computations;
• Good interpersonal skills and ability to work with little or no supervision;
• Previous experience (at least one year) in any of these position;
• Computer literacy with proficiency in MS word and excel.
• Experience in using android tablets to collect data on the field is an asset.