Soil & Water Conservation (SWC) Engineer (Specialist) – Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH
Engineering, Environment and Natural Resource
Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH
In Ethiopia, GIZ has been working for more than 40 years in bilateral cooperation on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and on commission of the Ethiopian government and international donors.
“Soil & Water Conservation (SWC) Engineer (Specialist)’’
GIZ- Internal/External Vacancy Announcement ‘# vacancy number 045/2023’
“CDSDRIII”
Brief Description of the project/ unit
GIZ supports the Ethiopian Government in various areas, increasingly also in the Ethiopian lowlands, which account for nearly 60% of Ethiopia’s land area. They are inhabited by more than 18 million (agro-)pastoralists, and people who create their livelihood from related professions. Due to population growth and the increasingly frequent occurrence of extreme weather events, this livelihood system is increasingly put at risk and the people, their livestock and the harvests have become increasingly vulnerable. Extensive resource use like overgrazing and deforestation causes food insecurity, soil degradation, and erosion. The result are dry valleys, in which rainwater flows quickly out of the area before being able to infiltrate into the soil. This further exacerbates desertification and food insecurity. To address this issue, the Dry Valley Rehabilitation and Productive Use (DVRPU) approach was developed in cooperation with the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) and the Bureaus of Agriculture (BoA) in Afar and Somali regions.
The Capacity Development for Strengthening Drought Resilience (CDSDR) Project has started its third phase. It promotes the DVRPU approach with a series of technical, biological, economic, social, institutional, and managerial measures applied to rehabilitate entire dry valleys for the benefit of the inhabitants and their animals while ensuring environmental stability. Besides upscaling of the approach in other weredas of Somali and Afar regions, it will further expand its application to selected lowland areas of Oromia and SNNPR regions.
The SWC Engineer works together and supports the CDSDR III implementation in Oromia region.
Duration of contract: Until June 30, 2025
Application deadline: 18 March 2023
Required Candidates: 1
Place of Work: Addis Ababa
Responsibilities and Duties
The SWC Engineer is responsible to support the project’s objectives by:
- Developing integrated soil and water conservation approaches in collaboration with government services and local communities;
- Studying, designing and constructing of physical soil and water conservation measures in selected kebeles
The SWC Engineer performs the following tasks:
- Supports on technical aspects of project implementation (water harvesting, irrigation, soil and water management);
- Supports the local communities for the implementation of land rehabilitation measures;
- Undertakes site identification, study and design of physical soil and water conservation measures;
- Develops bill of quantity and preparation of ToRs;
- Prepares implementation plan of recommended physical measures;
- Follows up and ensures proper implementation of measures and provide technical reports to regional project;
- Provides advices on the physical soil and water conservation measures to regional project team;
- Reports on output/outcomes of implemented technical measures;
- Supervising consultants and grant recipients and their contractual obligations
- Assure collection of data as required by the project monitoring and evaluation system
- Keeps regular contact and exchange of information with woreda level in Oromia;
Other duties/additional tasks
- The SWC Engineer performs other duties and tasks at the request of the management.
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in soil and water conservation engineering, Agricultural Engineering or, Civil engineering;
Professional experience
- 5 years practical field experience of working with soil conservation and water resources management in arid and semi-arid lowlands,
- Proven ability of study, design and construction of context-specific soil and water conservation measures in lowland areas like water spreading weirs;
- Experience with pastoral and/ or agro-pastoral communities in arid and semi-arid lowlands, preferably in Afar, Oromia, SNNP or Somali region;
- Understanding of impacts of environmental degradation and alternative natural resource management approaches.
- Experience in working with governmental structures, international organisations, NGOs and/or research institutes.
Other knowledge, additional competencies
- High level of motivation, proactivity, self-discipline, integrity and accountability;
- Readiness to work in rural lowland circumstances and frequent travel to project sites;
- Very good English, Oromiffa and Amharic language skills
- Computer skills in software application AutoCAD, MS-Office.
