Job Description

The Rainforest Alliance is creating a more sustainable world by using social and market forces to protect nature and improve the lives of farmers and forest communities. To achieve our mission, we partner with diverse allies around the world to drive positive change across global supply chains and in many of our most critically important natural landscapes.

Our alliance spans 70 countries and includes farmers and forest communities, companies, governments, civil society, and millions of individuals. Together we work to protect forests and biodiversity, take action on climate, and promote the rights and improve the livelihoods of rural people.

As an international nonprofit organization with more than 30 years of experience in sustainability transformation, we understand that the social and economic well-being of rural communities is tightly connected to ecosystem health. This knowledge has shaped our rigorous programs to advance sustainable land-use and commodity production.

At the Rainforest Alliance we combat climate change, protect forests and biodiversity, promote human rights, and improve livelihoods. The enormity of the social and environmental challenges we are facing requires working together in a broad alliance. This is why we bring farmers, forest communities, companies, and consumers together to change the way the world produces, sources, and consumes.

Why

To protect nature and improve lives it\'s becoming increasingly urgent that we approach the way we use our land and produce food and other products in more sustainable ways. For this to succeed we need to fundamentally change the way that businesses operate and source, and the choices we all make as consumers.

How

Our growing global alliance aims to transform our relationship with our natural resources and each other, to create a better future for people and nature together.

The Rainforest Alliance encourages diversity and inclusion across the global organization. With this commitment to diversity, we are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and do not discriminate on the basis of gender, race, color, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, ages, disability and any other protected group.

Position summary:

The Rainforest Alliance is looking for a proactive and strategic Senior Officer, Standards and Assurance (S&A), India & T\xc3\xbcrkiye to coordinate with and report to the Senior Manager, S&A Asia to work on the assurance and quality challenges in India & T\xc3\xbcrkiye to address risk issues.

Working in close collaboration with the relevant regional country teams, Customer Success and other S&A staff, the S&A Senior Officer will work to improve specific issues related to the implementation and auditing of the Rainforest Alliance 2020 Certification Program by Certificate Holders (CHs) and Certificate Bodies (CBs).

The S&A Senior Officer will lead on and implement the operational activities of the Global S&A department for India & T\xc3\xbcrkiye, helping to ensure the credibility and functioning of the Standard and Assurance system activities. The S&A Senior Officer will lead in the license review process, training of CBs and regional staff and Associated Trainer Networks (ATNs) on the 2020 RA Standard and conducts country risk assessments on the main production and auditing contexts.

Responsibilities:

The Rainforest Alliance\'s Core Values are Impact, Change, Collaboration, Openness and Trust and as such they form the basis of the behaviors we demonstrate.

Proactively supports, answers questions, gives information and advice - via e-mail, phone and other - to the Leadership Team, department heads, RA colleagues, CBs and CHs on the RA Standards and implementation of the Certification Rules;

Implements a monitoring program on RA certification which includes license reviews, interpreting audit results, leading on credibility cases and compliance, solves problems and/or makes recommendations if necessary to the relevant management;

Initiate and organize the development and implementation of the annual plan together with the Senior Manager Asia, for the assigned countries and coordinate the annual plan with the broader regional/country plans to capture synergies;

Accountable for the implementation and execution of the Standards & Assurance annual plan and activities for India & T\xc3\xbcrkiye, including observing audits;

Contribute to country risk assessments and use this information to design and implement Quality of Implementation activities for the region. Manage reputational risks in coordination with S&A senior management and regional management;

Maintain an analysis for S&A management of the regional activities, including audits, non-conformities, quality of a sample of audit reports and licenses to evaluate the interpretations for the Standard and certification rules, information about selling/purchasing certified volumes along supply chain and makes recommendations for improvements;

Build and maintain networks with colleagues in countries of oversight, providing input and contributions to country-specific projects where S&A is part of to prevent re-occurrence of credibility issues in the region;

Organizes, develops and provides workshops, trainings and/or webinars based on training needs assessments and other inputs to CBs and other stakeholders (internal and external) as needed;

Develops, updates, distributes, and implements certification processes/procedures, and relevant tools/materials for the region, target group and/or product; and

Works together with customer success and Certification partner support teams to identify the need for standard contextualization, policy, and guidance. Identifies assurance risks and passes this onto the CB Monitoring team and S&A management.

Qualifications:

Master\'s Degree in agronomy/rural development/sociology/environmental science/forestry;

Minimum 5 years\' experience in sustainable agriculture certification and tea supply chains or equivalent. Other commodities such as coffee, cocoa, nuts, flowers and fruits is preferred;

Proficient in Microsoft Excel, Word, and Outlook with a demonstrated experience in accounting software and working knowledge of PowerPoint;

Outstanding interpersonal and communication skills, both written and verbal;

Ability to form and maintain collaborative networks both internally and externally;

Strategic mindset, able to identify trends, respond to challenges before they become issues, and provide insights into broader strategies and workplans;

Able to work independently;

Fluency verbal and written communication skills in English is required.

Demonstrated commitment to the RA mission and values; and

Ability to travel a minimum of 30% per year in the region and/or internationally.

Job level: 4A

Salary: Commensurate with experience.

Deadline: 07 June 2023

Notes:

Only candidates authorized to work in India will be considered

If you have any questions about the job vacancy, please contact the HR department: recruitment@ra.org

Rainforest Alliance