National Programme Officer in Agriculture, Food Security and Rural Development

The Swiss Cooperation Office in Vientiane designs and steers the Government of Switzerland’s bilateral development programme in Lao PDR. We support the Lao Government in reducing poverty and in reaching the Sustainable Development Goals. The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) gives priority to sustainable and equitable development, especially in rural areas with minorities, to governance reforms favouring the poor and disadvantaged, to gender equity, and to social justice. We are a Swiss-Lao team of highly motivated professionals looking for a dynamic Lao national or resident to reinforce our expertise in the Vientiane Office, and to fill the position of:

National Programme Officer in Agriculture, Food Security and Rural Development

SDC is currently supporting four large projects in the field of agriculture and nutrition, according to its regional strategy. We are looking for an experienced agriculture/rural development specialist to monitor part of the Agriculture and Food Security portfolio.

The incumbent will be responsible for the following tasks:

• Project Management: monitors assigned projects of the portfolio supporting project cycles and controlling both operational and financial performance, represents SDC in dialogues and negotiations with implementing partners, government institutions and international providers of technical assistance and produces good quality English language documents;
• Partner and Policy Dialogue: takes part in thematic discussions and agriculture sector policy dialogue;
• Sector Development: analyses trends and  opportunities related to upland agriculture and agrobiodiversity, and  produces good quality English language inputs for decision making processes;
• Strategy implementation: takes part in the SDC internal annual monitoring and planning processes and produces good quality English language inputs; supports the communication and outreach plan and prepares relevant and useful messages.

Is this an interesting challenge for you? Do you have:

• A master in agriculture, agronomy, economics, natural science or related discipline;
• Well-developed social skills and willingness to work in a team;
• Strong analytical skills;
• Interest in and ambition to develop broader expertise in the development cooperation field;
• Good self-management skills, flexibility and resilience to work under pressure, with a proven track record of delivering results to a high standard under tight timeframes;
• Ability to ensure good communication and flow of information;
• Very good English language skills, both orally and written;
• Interest and availability to travel both in Laos and internationally.

SDC is a value-based equal opportunities employer, appointing on merits by open competition. We highly encourage women and persons from ethnic minority background to apply. Please send your Curriculum Vitae (incl. references, certificates and expected salary) and an application letter (not more than one page) explaining why we should consider you to be the ideal candidate for the position. Please send your application to:

For more information about SDC and our programmes, please visit:

www.facebook.com/SwissCooperationMekong or www.eda.admin.ch/laos

Closing date for applications is 09 November 2018.

Only short-listed candidates will be contacted for interview. SDC does not return application files.