Community Engagement Field Officer

  Lebanon Reforestation Initiative Terms of Reference Community Engagement Field Officer   I. INTRODUCTION Project Background Information The Lebanon Reforestation Initiative is an ongoing, multi-year project funded by United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and implemented by the United States Forest Service (USFS), implementing a community-based reforestation program that has resulted so far in the planting of more than half- a-million native trees throughout Lebanon since 2011.  The project promotes a community-led approach to reforestation, bringing together diverse committed municipalities, community stakeholders, Lebanese civil society organizations, and other actors such as the private sector, to restore and replant degraded community lands. With administrative offices in Beirut, LRI technical experts manage a multi-year work program of activities throughout Lebanon in collaboration with grassroots organizations and local communities. Community Engagement Recent economic, social and environmental developments have increased attention given to the role that good governance and sustainable engagement of local communities plays in achieving long-term development goals. Reforestation being a long-term process that requires continuous follow-up and good management, active community involvement and community ownership of this process becomes crucial for its success. LRI seeks to ensure a process of community involvement and local community-based governance that enables interested local citizens or stakeholders to meet on equal terms to facilitate a participatory decision making process. The goal is to provide local communities and their constituent stakeholders with ownership of the project to help promote success and longer-term sustainability. With the increasing Syrian refugee crisis, and the consequent accentuation of environmental and socio-economic issues in Lebanese rural areas, LRI also seeks to facilitate dialogue between the local communities of different backgrounds, and between host communities and Syrian refugees, to support them in assessing their common environmental concerns and jointly planning solutions to those common problems.  II. PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNEMENT LRI seeks a full time Community Engagement Field Officer to work under the supervision of the Senior Manager for Social Stability and Community Engagement to help promote community ownership and governance of reforestation projects in the North and Chouf region where LRI is working to expand its reforestation activities on a social and environmental corridor level.  The Community Engagement Field Officer will focus on establishing sustainable environmental committees in each town included in LRI’s reforestation activities as well as corridor planning committees in up to three corridors (North & Chouf), promoting local ownership of reforestation efforts and supporting them to develop their own community engagement plans, defining common environmental issues and advocating for them, and identifying ways of bringing neighboring communities together over reforestation efforts, with emphasis on communities hosting large numbers of Syrian refugees.   The Field Officer is expected to perform the following duties: Implement the governance and social stability strategy that builds upon the stakeholder engagement conducted to date by LRI and its partners; Identify key local stakeholders as “champions,” building upon LRI-initiated community development plans in communities where LRI has initiated reforestation projects; Assist in the establishment of local environmental committees (ECs) and corridor planning committees (CPCs) that can serve as a governance board for the environmental activities; Help integrate into the activities of the community interest group multiple objectives of LRI community engagement, including outplanting, fire management, environmental awareness, etc.; Facilitate the development of work plans for each interest group; Facilitate regular meetings of interest groups to support their activities; Assess the social interactions between neighboring communities in the identified corridors and help create linkages between both through dialogue and joint planning for activities; Assess the social interactions between the Syrian refugees and the local communities and help create linkages between both through dialogue and joint planning for activities; Coordinate the collection and interpretation of community mobilization, governance and social stability best practice and other social data and make them available to community interest groups to enrich their efforts; Document the process of establishing community interest groups through written, photographic and video media to provide model case studies of reforestation-related community mobilization for use in other communities; Coordinate regularly with the Senior manager for Social Stability and Community Engagement and other staff members on weekly meetings at LRI office; Organize workshops, meetings, roundtables and other events when needed; Effectively identify, collect, and analyze relevant data, lessons learned, and observation to form conclusions by working closely with the LRI monitoring and evaluation officer. Any other related activities and assistance that may reasonably be required. III. REQUIREMENTS The Community Engagement Field Officer should possess the following competencies, skills, and experience: Bachelor’s degree in Social Work or any related background; At least 3 years of relevant experience in the development of integrated strategies for community engagement in rural areas in Lebanon; Demonstrated track record of success in achieving community mobilization and engagement in diverse communities; Extensive experience working in rural areas in Lebanon; experience in the Beqaa region is preferred; Strong analytical and inter-personal skills; Excellent reporting and presentation skills; Outstanding organizational and time-management skills; Ability to meet deadlines and handle criticism positively; Willingness to travel outside Beirut to the project sites for at least 80% of the time; Fluency in both written and spoken English and Arabic; and Possess a car and a driving license and able to use his/her car for field trips on a cost-reimbursable basis. IV. Contact Information For further information or to submit a letter of interest and accompanying curriculum vitae, preferably by Friday, July 15, 2016, please contact: Lebanon Reforestation Initiative     info@lri-lb.org