Social and Environmental Safeguards Consultant - World Cocoa Foundation

Established in 2000, the World Cocoa Foundation (WCF) is the world’s leading organization for cocoa sustainability. The long-term goals of WCF are set out in our new strategy:

• Prosperous cocoa farmers become truly sustainable and profitable, with transformation of traditional smallholder farming into modern business that deliver sustainable livelihoods for farmers and their families;
• Empowered cocoa-growing communities lead their own development, human rights are protected, and safety and wellbeing of children and families are strengthened; and
• A healthy planet is conserved and enhanced, with resilient and biodiverse landscapes in cocoa geographies, and the carbon footprint of the sector is reduced.

WCF works in six areas:

1. Convene cocoa and chocolate industry in collective action – to build an aligned, motivated, and knowledgeable membership engaged in collective action;
2. Facilitate multi-stakeholder partnerships – to engage and leverage the knowledge, financing, skills, and power of different stakeholders to jointly identify and solve key sustainability challenges in the cocoa sector;
3. Facilitate industry engagement in policy dialogue with government – to identify and address key barriers in the enabling business and policy environment in cocoa producing countries;
4. Promote industry learning, knowledge sharing, and monitoring and evaluation – in order to identify industry-wide lessons learned and good practices to accelerate science, innovation and impact within companies and across the sector, and strengthen transparency and accountability of industry results and performance;
5. Help mobilize resources from development partners and financial and capital market institutions – to leverage the additional financing that industry will require to successfully implement collective action initiatives; and,
6. Communicate industry investment and impact and manage reputational risks – to showcase industry’s sustainability efforts and results while identifying and proactively managing risks, particularly related to human rights and environment.

WCF is a membership organization open to private sector companies engaged in all aspects of the cocoa supply chain. WCF is headquartered in Washington, D.C., with offices in Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire

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Job Description

Consultancy Summary

The consultant will lead efforts to develop guidance on the alignment and application of appropriate social and environmental safeguards in line with activities in the Cocoa and Forest Initiative (CFI) in Ghana. In November 2017, the government of Ghana and leading cocoa and
 chocolate companies signed the joint CFI Framework for Action outlining key commitments and actions to eliminate deforestation from the cocoa sector and restore degraded forests in Ghana.

The commitments focus on three core areas: 1) Forest protection and restoration which covers the conservation and rehabilitation of National Parks, Wildlife Sanctuaries, Wildlife Resource Reserves, Forest Reserves, and off-reserve forest lands; 2) Sustainable production and farmers’ livelihood which this covers sustainable intensification and diversification of production in order to increase farmers’ yields and income and to reduce pressure on forests; and 3) community engagement and social inclusion which covers social safeguards through civil society and community engagement.

In 2018, the and CFI Oversight Committee, hosted by the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources, adopted the World Bank’s social and environmental safeguards to address issues impacting farmers and communities that may arise from CFI activities. Provisions are further outlined under the Ghana National Implementation Plan (NIP). The World Bank safeguards are integrated in the Ghana Cocoa Forest REDD+ Program and the National REDD+ Secretariat (NRS) has developed a country driven approach hosted on the public Safeguards Information System.

The objective of this consultancy is to provide guidance to CFI Signatories and other stakeholders on how the different safeguards are triggered and addressed as a result of CFI activities.

Consultancy Details

This position is based in Accra and will work with the Ghana CFI Program Manager and report to the Director of Environment (Washington, DC). The consultant will also work with the CFI Safeguards taskforce providing technical support to CFI Ghana. Applicants must be authorized to work in Ghana. This is a locally recruited position; no expat benefits are provided.

Duration

This consultancy is expected to last no more than two (2) months with an immediate start date.

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Specific Responsibilities:

• Develop a methodology and workplan for completion of the assignment. The methodology should identify resources, documents, and technical experts needed to complete the assignment.
• Develop a CFI Social Safeguards Guidance Document. This will be reviewed by the Safeguards task force and revised by the consultant.
• Develop a Practical Guide that will help signatory companies implement safeguards that are triggered as part of their CFI action plans. This will be reviewed by the Safeguards task force and revised by the consultant.
• Facilitate a training session on the practical guide for company focal points, CFI Safeguards taskforce members, the NRS Working group on Safeguards, and other relevant stakeholders. Produce a report including a participant list upon completion of the training.

Expected Outputs

The consultant would be required to produce the following outputs

1. CFI Social and Environmental Safeguards Guidance Document
2. Practical guide on implementation of safeguards document
3. Training report

Required Skills or Experience

• Proven knowledge of the World Bank’s Environmental and Social Standards (ESS).
• Demonstrated training on and application of the World Bank Environmental and Social Standards, the Cancun Safeguards, and related national laws.
• Knowledge of the Ghana REDD+ Safeguards processes including the country-driven approach and the Safeguards Information System (SIS).
• A minimum of ten (10) years of experience with at least five (5) years in the assessment, implementation, and monitoring of safeguards.