Education

• Degree in Agricultural Economics, Horticulture, Agribusiness, Supply Chain, Development Studies, or similar. Master’s is useful but not required.
  

Experience

• Good experience in the sector doing market access or value-chain roles. You should have worked directly with buyers, processors or exporters. A good fit would have 2 - 3 years experience.
  
• Hands-on experience designing aggregation/collection models and negotiating MOUs/offtake agreements.
  
• Field experience in East Africa and with crops like mango, chilli, coffee, tomato or spices is a big advantage.
  

You will build a disciplined buyer pipeline and a buyer-requirements library we can act on.

What this looks like every day:

• Find and profile buyers: local processors, traders/aggregators, institutional buyers, and export-adjacent firms.
  
• Run structured conversations (we will give you templates). Capture exactly: crop types, quality specs, allowable moisture, packaging, traceability needs, indicative price bands (not negotiated prices), minimum and trial volumes, payment terms and buyer expectations.
  
• Record everything in a buyer intelligence file: buyer name, contact, date, notes, and a short, factual summary of their requirements. No hearsay. No “I think”. Only documented inputs.
  
• Keep a buyer prioritization framework so we focus on buyers who can actually scale volume and pay on time.
  

You will run the practical work that turns buyer interest into acceptance.

What this looks like:

• Coordinate how samples are prepared (drying to agreed QA rules), packaged and delivered.
  
• Use a structured feedback form to capture buyer responses and rejection reasons. Record exactly why a trial failed or passed.
  
• Keep a clean pipeline: Leads → Active Trials → Trial Outcomes → Repeat Interest / Negotiation.
  
• Make sure lessons from trials go straight to Field, Product and QA teams so we fix the real problems.
  

You will test whether buyer prices match the real costs and whether the value chain is financially viable.

What this looks like:

• Work with the Grants and Partnerships Lead and the Business Growth and Enablement team to compare buyer price bands to real costs (drying, collection, packing, transport, commissions).
  
• Tell us which value chains are viable and which are not, and why. Flag margin or payment risks early.
  
• Build simple financial scenarios: break-even, sensitivity to price swings, and the impact of late payments. Keep models readable — not fancy, just correct and usable.