Old job: Local Food Safety Policy and Regulation Specialist

Terms of Reference

Title: Local Food Safety Policy and Regulation Specialist

Timing: May 2024 – March 2025, with extension possibility

Level of Effort: Part-time – up to 12 days/ month.

Project context

Alinea International Ltd. (Canada) provides management and technical expertise to developing and transitional country partners on projects that promote sustainable growth and meaningful opportunities for people to improve their lives. The Safe Food for Growth project (SAFEGRO) which is funded by the Government of Canada through Global Affairs Canada (GAC) for the period from 2019 to 2024, with extension to 2026, is being supported technically by the Canadian Executing Agency (CEA), led by Alinea in partnership with the University of Guelph and other leading food safety organizations.

The SAFEGRO is designed to support the Government of Vietnam to ensure better access to safe and competitive agri-food products, with an aim to improve the well-being of female and male consumers as well as other beneficiaries (including poor farmers) in Vietnam. The project operates across the agri-food value chains by engaging and building the capacity of three main target groups: the public sector (enabling environment), the private sector (supply side), and the consumer (demand side) to achieve 3 inter-related component outcomes:

Intermediate Outcome (1100) – Enabling environment: "Improved performance of national and sub-national governments in food safety regulation enforcement along the value chain to meet international standards”.
Intermediate Outcome (1200) – Supply side: "Increased competitiveness of poor farmers and other actors, particularly women, supplying safe agri-food products to domestic and international markets”.
Intermediate Outcome (1300) – Demand side: "Increased consumer demand for safe and affordable agri-food in Vietnam".

The SAFEGRO technical team works with national and sub-national governments to enforce food safety regulations, private sector suppliers to increase the competitiveness of Vietnamese food products domestically and internationally, and consumers to improve demand for safe food in Vietnam. Key partners on this project include The Ministry of Agriculture Rural Development (MARD), the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT), the Ministry of Health (MOH), Ha Noi and Ho Chi Minh city agencies, and other Vietnamese Academic Institutes.

The government of Vietnam has committed to promote environmentally friendly, climate-smart agricultural technology and practices, and gender equality by making these cross-cutting issues in all political, economic, cultural, and social spheres. Therefore, within the scope of SAFEGRO project, gender equality shall be integrated across all activities in the TORs to ensure: (i) collection of gender-disaggregated data for reporting and MEL; (ii) gender-sensitivity languages, photos, images, messages, etc.; (iii) equal participation in decision-making and benefit of women and men from activities and services; (iv) gender analysis before any intervention, decisions, or outlining plans and; (v) gender equality mainstreaming is discussed at all meetings and consultations with government counterparts, regardless of the topics, technical or otherwise.

The Project mobilizes international and national consultants to provide high quality technical assistance and capacity building activities to the government agencies and chain actors including support for review and recommendations related to the food safety legislative, regulatory, and policy framework. To implement the project activities, Alinea International is seeking a part-time Local Food Safety Policy and Regulation Specialist for the SAFEGRO project.

Scope of Work

The Local Food Safety Policy and Regulation Specialist (LFSPRS) will be based in Hanoi and work closely with the International Regulation and Policy Specialist and policy team of national consultants and relevant Vietnamese stakeholders providing expert advice on all matters pertaining to food safety policy and regulation. The LFSPRS will serve as a focal point for the project policy team by coordinating all policy and regulatory research and development progress and quality. He/she will be under the supervision of the Project Director (PD) and Project Manager (PM). The position requires fieldwork for collecting information and consultation as inputs to the work.

Detail responsibilities/tasks, deliverable.

The LFSPRS will perform the main tasks but not limited as bellow:

No	Deliverables	Responsibilities
1	Coordination of component 1 (enabling environment) activities and reporting	Work with the International Regulation and Policy Specialist to propose a strategy and intervention plan for the project on Food safety regulatory and policy changes, with focus on the selected value chains, with the Vietnamese stakeholders including government agencies, academia, private industry. Act as focal point to work with government agencies, project partners, identifying and addressing needs on policy and regulatory analysis, approval, advocacy process and capacity buildings. Take lead in coordination and implementation of project’s policy and regulatory research and analysis activities under the component 1 in working with the International Regulation and Policy Specialist. Oversee and monitor other national and short-term consultants to ensure timely schedule and high-quality services/products from the project to target benefiting government agencies. Develop TORs for other policy national/short-term consultants and policy related activities as required. Coordinate the organization of related events, technical trainings, field visits with partners and government agencies when required.
2	Technical inputs to development and analysis of required regulations and policies	Provide direct technical inputs in certain policy and regulatory analysis and development required by Government agencies and support them to improve their implementation capacity and enforcement performance. Actively participate in other activities as required by the work nature, such as: interviewing, meeting with relevant stakeholders, line ministries; participating in consultation workshops.
3	Inputs to all project reporting requirements	Provide inputs related to component 1 in the development of the Performance Measurement Framework (PMF), the risk register, annual work plans, monthly highlight reports, semi-annual and annual reports.
4	Other related duties as required by the PD and PM	TBD as determined by further needs assessment, government requests and project management needs.

Required qualification:

The Local Food Safety Policy and Regulation specialist must possess the following minimum qualifications and experience:

Master’s degree in a relevant discipline such as: agricultural production, food science, animal or plant health science, administration, or law.
Level 4 - Advanced Professional Proficiency in English (oral, reading and writing).
60 months of combined professional experience in:

governmental regulation and policy development procedures in the context of food safety, agricultural production or public health related to food.
providing advice and making recommendations regarding the most appropriate and effective means to communicate regulatory and policy information to target audiences; and
contributing to the development of communication plans appropriate for regulatory and policy changes.

Preference should be given to candidates who possess knowledge of internationally recognized food safety, agricultural production and plant and animal health standards and policies such as Codex, OIE, FAO, WHO, etc.

Compensation

Alinea offers competitive salaries. Salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.

Please send your application (letter of interest and CV with details on qualifications and experiences aligned with above requirements) with at least 3 referees by email to <[email protected]>. Please include the job title in your email subject line.

Application form: Only via email

Deadline: 17h00 on 27 May 2024

Interview announcement via email to selected candidate within 15 working days after the deadline.

We welcome all applications, regardless of ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression; candidates that belong to underrepresented groups are strongly encouraged to apply. The recruitment process is based on fair standards.

VUFO NGO Resource Centre

Local Food Safety Policy and Regulation Specialist