National Lead Livestock Specialist

The National Lead Livestock Specialist will provide technical leadership and support to ensure the quality, coherence and effective implementation of livestock-related activities across relevant projects in Sudan. The role involves coordination with government authorities, partners, and communities to strengthen livestock production systems, animal health, disease surveillance, and value chains, contributing to resilience and sustainable livelihoods.

Responsibilities

• Provide technical leadership and guidance in the design, planning and implementation of livestock-related interventions, including livestock restocking, animal health campaigns, vaccination, disease surveillance, fodder production, pasture rehabilitation and livestock water infrastructure.
• Support needs assessments, vulnerability and beneficiary targeting, feed balance and gap assessments, livestock value chain analyses and other technical assessments required for programme design and implementation.
• Provide technical quality assurance during beneficiary selection, distribution of livestock and related inputs, vaccination and treatment campaigns, fodder establishment and other field activities.
• Provide technical oversight and support to implementing partners and monitor the quality and timely delivery of livestock-related activities and Letter of Agreement (LoA) deliverables in accordance with FAO standards.
• Coordinate with relevant federal and state veterinary authorities, State Ministries, private service providers, Community Animal Health Workers (CAHWs) and communities on vaccination, deworming, treatment campaigns, disease surveillance and cold-chain management.
• Support the strengthening of early warning, disease reporting and community-based animal health systems and contribute to contingency planning and livelihood protection measures in crisis-affected areas.
• Promote livestock interventions that are resilient, conflict-sensitive, gender- and youth-responsive and adapted to climate variability and changing environmental conditions.
• Develop and facilitate technical capacity-building activities for implementing partners, veterinarians, CAHWs, extension workers, producer associations and women and youth livestock groups, including training on animal husbandry, animal health, nutrition, fodder management and rangeland management.
• Contribute to strengthening livestock value chains and producer organizations, with particular attention to improving access to services, markets, inputs and livelihood opportunities.
• Coordinate with land governance, natural resource management and other relevant technical specialists to address land–livestock conflicts, pasture use and sustainable natural resource management.
• Develop and apply appropriate technical indicators, beneficiary registers and monitoring tools for livestock-related outputs and provide technical inputs to project monitoring and evaluation frameworks.
• Prepare technical inputs for project progress reports, donor reports and missions, Results-Oriented Monitoring (ROM), lessons learned, visibility materials and other programme documentation.
• Ensure that livestock interventions incorporate appropriate safeguards, accountability to affected populations (AAP), prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse (PSEA), environmental and climate-related considerations, and risk mitigation measures.
• Contribute to operational research, after-action reviews and analysis of the effectiveness, cost-efficiency and value for money of different livestock intervention modalities.
• Represent and support FAO in technical meetings, coordination mechanisms, working groups and discussions with government authorities, UN agencies, clusters, donors, partners and other relevant stakeholders on livestock-related matters.
• Prepare technical case studies, success stories, lessons learned, policy briefs and other knowledge products to document and communicate results and good practices.
• Perform any other related duties as required.

Requirements

• Advanced university degree in Veterinary Medicine, Animal Science, Livestock Production, Animal Health, Agriculture, Natural Resource Management or a related field.
• Minimum of 5 years of relevant professional experience in livestock production, animal health, veterinary services, livestock development, pastoral/agro-pastoral systems or related areas.
• Working knowledge (level C) of English and Arabic.
• National of Sudan.
• Extensive and relevant experience in livestock development, animal health, veterinary services and pastoral/agro-pastoral production systems.
• Experience in the design, implementation and technical monitoring of livestock, livelihood, resilience or emergency interventions.
• Experience in animal disease surveillance, vaccination campaigns and community-based animal health services.
• Experience working with government institutions, implementing partners, UN agencies, NGOs and other stakeholders in livestock or related programmes.
• Knowledge of livestock production systems, fodder/feed management, rangeland management and livestock value chains.
• Experience in field assessments, monitoring and technical reporting, including the use of relevant indicators and monitoring tools.
• Experience working in conflict-affected, climate-vulnerable or humanitarian contexts is an asset.
• Knowledge of the Sudanese livestock sector and pastoral/agro-pastoral context is highly desirable.

Skills

• Veterinary Medicine
• Animal Science
• Livestock Production
• Animal Health
• Veterinary Services
• Livestock Development
• Pastoral Systems
• Agro-pastoral Systems
• Livestock Disease Surveillance
• Vaccination Campaigns
• Community-based Animal Health
• Livestock Value Chain
• Fodder Management
• Feed Management
• Rangeland Management
• Livelihoods Interventions
• Resilience-building Interventions
• Emergency Interventions
• Field Assessments
• Technical Reporting
• Monitoring Tools Development

Languages

English, Arabic