LED Jobs & Opportunity

UNCDF is recruting for a 1 year contract starting 03 May 2010 a Local Economic Development Adviser for The Dictrict Development Programme in Uganda. The programme is expected to last 3 years.

Background

The District Development Programme III aims at building systems and methodologies to enhance the role of local governments in Promoting the development of their local economies. This is expected to spur growth and enhance household incomes thereby promoting local economic development (LED). LED is a process in which partnerships between Local Governments (LGs), the private sector and the community is established to manage and utilize resources at the local level to stimulate the economy of a well defined territory, which functions within a national economic, policy, regulatory and institutional framework. The Programme will be piloted in 15 districts of Uganda over a four-year period.

The Programme is funded through grants from the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Government of Austria.  It is also financed through the Government of Uganda's LGSIP Basket fund. Under the DDP-III, the Ministry will engage two specialists to support the implementation of the programme. The two specialists shall be recruited on one-year renewable contracts and shall be working as part of the Programme Support Team (PST), which will be implementing this programme.

Key Result Areas of the Third District Development Project (DDP-III)

• Enhancing the capacity of Local Governments to plan and provide services that support locality development such as energy supply, access roads to high productive areas, water supply mains, market infrastructure etc. This will also involve setting up systems for the provision of seed capital to community groups so as to stimulate and create economic infrastructure at the LG and community level.
• Assisting to build the capacity of Local Governments to foster effective governance local economic governance through strengthening institutions such as the District Commercial Office, market associations and business centres.
• Stimulating the demand for business and market development services by LGs by providing technical support to the Local Governments to catalyze manufacturing, agriculture production and services. It will also entail assisting local institutions of learning to develop training programmes that incorporate and deliver courses on locality development, business management, resource mobilization and management in their curricula.
• Institutionalizing and activating national capacity for entrenching LED at the national level;
• promoting gender equity in LED is embedded in the local LED promotion systems and activated.
• Strengthening access to justice at the local level with emphasis on LED promotion. 

Duties and Responsibilities
Functions/Key results

Provide technical support and facilitation to the PST to enable them to effectively guide Programme activities at both the national and local levels. He/she shall support the PST's function as the technical secretariat to the Programme Technical Committee (PTC), ensuring the Committee is actively engaged in providing strategic support and facilitation of Programme activities and contributing to the improvement of the national framework for LED;

Provide support and guidance on the activities to create a national level understanding of LED and its gradual enhancement. These activities will include but will be limited to the following:

Provide technical support and facilitation to the PST to enable them to effectively guide Programme activities at both the national and local levels. He/she shall support the PST's function as the technical secretariat to the Programme Technical Committee (PTC), ensuring the Committee is actively engaged in providing strategic support and facilitation of Programme activities and contributing to the improvement of the national framework for LED;

Provide support and guidance on the activities to create a national level understanding of LED and its gradual enhancement. These activities will include but will be limited to the following:

• In coordination with other specialized national agencies/ministries and institutions, develop a common LED understanding of the national economy and the position of regional/local economies within it;
• Assess LED related macro policies and their impact on LED prospects;
• Documenting national LED related strategies and programmes implemented by ministries or national agencies, evaluate the extent to which they are coordinated and assess their contribution to LED;
• Develop a map of the various institutional actors engaged in LED promotion including national ministries, their de-concentrated branches, local governments, and non-governmental organizations/agencies, private sector institutions and civil society/community organizations and document their mandates and assigned functions.
• Synthesizing existing studies and assessments on the national business. This should encompass an assessment of the state of economic infrastructure, the quality of the regulatory environment and the state of development of the business development and financial services sectors;

Develop effective coordination and communication arrangements with LED relevant national entities (ministries, agencies, development partner agencies, participating LGs etc.) to ensure that LED related policies, strategies, and actions are effectively informed by lessons learned and harmonized with local priorities:

Identifying and assisting national and local institutions of learning to develop training Programmes that incorporate and deliver practical concepts and practices on LED in their curricula as part of a longer term sustainability strategy;

Identifying, categorizing and liaising with other international LED promotion initiatives and development networks, especially those in the Eastern and Southern Africa for cross learning, information exchange and peer monitoring;

Developing, operating and managing an M&E Framework, together with its attendant instruments in addition to the Business and Local Economic Assessment Tools so as to systematically document the lessons learnt under the DDP-III;

Regularly liaising with the managers of the various DDP-III components in the Ministry of Local Government and that of Gender, Labour and Community Development, who shall be responsible for executing the programme;

Carryout any other duties as may be assigned by the DDP-III programme coordinator and UNCDF, from time to time.

Impact of Results

This post will contribute to the development of an understanding of context for LED at the national and local levels and on establishing strong working linkages with and between the main players including Local Governments, Central Government agencies, private sector organizations, Non-Governmental Organizations and development partners, who are involved in related programmes and actions in the country. Ultimatly, this effort aims to contribute to ensuring that LED related macro policies that are designed and implemented by national agencies become more responsive to the growth needs of local of local economies.  In addition, this post will support the strengthening of the role of Local Governments to promote LED within the pilot localities.

Competencies

This is a senior position in the Programme Support Team (PST) of the Ministry of Local Government. It requires a self-motivated individual with a higher degree in economics, urban planning, local (economic) development, business administration or a related field with wide experience in economic development programmes, preferably at the Local level. The SDE reports to the Coordinator of the PST and will be responsible for providing technical oversight and support towards mapping and enhancing national policy, regulatory and institutional framework for LED promotion.

Required Skills and Experience
Education:

A Masters degree or higher in local (economic) development, economics, business administration or urban development/ planning. Additional qualifications in local and regional development-related studies will be an added advantage.

Experience:

• A minimum of ten-years experience in local (rural and urban) economic development, building business capacities and developing strategies for micro level investments. Knowledge of small-scale business strategy development will be essential for this job.
• Experience in working directly or indirectly with local governments on local economic development.
• Should possess excellent communication and facilitation skills with ability to work with rural communities and the business community effectively.
• Knowledge on and exposure to locality and enterprise development initiatives in the eastern and southern African region will be an added advantage.
• Should have experience in developing locality development strategies and tools.
  Language

Fluency in English both written and spoken.