Amazon Regional Fund Manager

Amazon Regional Fund Manager

Programme overview

Palladium is recruiting for a grants and programme support
professional to work on the UK PACT (Partnering for Accelerated Climate
Transitions) programme. UK PACT is a UK Government programme funded through
International Climate Finance (ICF) that has been running since 2018 and
currently operates in over ten countries.

The programme's overall objective is to alleviate poverty, working primarily
through reducing greenhouse gas emissions. UK PACT is a flexible technical assistant
(TA) programme that is designed to support ODA eligible countries to increase
their future climate ambitions, reduce their emissions, and accelerate just
transitions to clean growth. A key feature of UK PACT is that it aims to
respond explicitly to partner government demand for capacity building
interventions, and that it shares UK expertise (for example in areas such as
climate legislation, green finance, and smart energy).

Location

This role can be based in Bogota, Colombia or Sao Paulo,
Brazil.

Primary responsibilities

The UK PACT Amazon Regional Fund Manager will be the
'on-the-ground' regional liaison for Palladium affirming and implementing the
FCDO strategy for UK PACT in Bolivia, Ecuador, Guyana, with additional support
to Peru, managing day-to-day activities from stakeholder engagement, portfolio
strategy, providing key contextual insights and managing the ongoing portfolio
of grants.

Specifically, the Fund Manager will:

Stakeholder Relationships:

• Maintain an excellent working relationship with each BHC team on post (Bolivia, Ecuador, Guyana, with additional support to Peru), supporting them in engagement with partner country government agencies, civil society groups, research agencies, financial institutions and relevant private sector firms to collaboratively design and generate buy-in for the programme's strategy, plans, and resource requirements.
• Act as an ambassador for UK PACT in the Amazon region promoting funding opportunities to potential implementing partners, project and programme outputs to intended beneficiaries, and broader UK engagement on low-carbon development where relevant, and as agreed with FCDO.

Strategy Development and Engagement:

• Work collaboratively with BHC team, FCDO UK, the Palladium core team to implement an adaptive strategy for UK PACT-funded projects in-country drawing on the various types of funds, skill-shares and technical assistance available.
• Identifying complementary existing programmes (funded by the UK and other donors) to feed into UK PACT country implementation plans, theories of change and log-frames and avoid programme duplication.
• Provide technical advice and input for continuous context analysis and assessment of local market capacity to identify the most appropriate avenues for interventions and pathways to climate change impact within each key strategic sector, and flag policy, technological and commercial developments and risks that could influence the delivery of UK-Amazon region climate collaboration.

Programme Management; Identification, Selection and
Implementation of Interventions:

• Coordinate grant funding windows in accordance with country implementation plans, and lead on market engagement to ensure the right local stakeholders are aware of, and well-placed to apply for, funding opportunities.
• Organise and manage a call for proposals in collaboration with post, the Palladium team in the UK and the FCDO lead.
• Facilitate and contribute to the project selection process, particularly assessing technical feasibility, deliverability and impact potential on the ground.
• Support project set-up coordinating with the Palladium core team to adhere to any local due diligence required and to support initial briefing to potential Implementation Partners;
• Oversee timely implementation of projects and regularly ensure the feedback of results, impacts and learning through quarterly reports to FCDO covering overall progress, progress against outputs, main activities and deliverables for the next period, budget, spend and forecast, and risks;
• Advise FCDO on potential to extend, scale up or replicate successful projects, and work with successful Implementation Partners to do this with FCDO approval.
• Support defence against fraud, corruption and safeguarding risks, conducting spot checks and other processes to ensure FCDO grant funding is spent as intended and that Implementation Partners meet FCDO compliance requirements.

Programme Reporting:

• Support Implementing Partners on project reporting, ensuring reporting meets FCDO requirements.
• Oversee country and project specific risk management, working with all parties, ensuring any issues identified result in quick mitigation strategies and/or are escalated as required.
• Contribute to programme governance and decision-making, both in-country and centrally, as required.

Key Competencies and Professional Expertise/Competencies
Preferred:

• Excellent
  programme and grant management skills, with a proven track record of
  managing a complex portfolio of grantees in various sectors.
• Strong
  reporting skills with proven ability to engage with and manage donor
  client formal reporting and ad-hoc requests.
• Good
  understanding of one or more sectors such as agriculture, forestry and
  land use, green finance, energy transition in Latin America.
• Good
  knowledge about the environmental / low carbon sector in terms of policy
  landscape,
• Relevant
  knowledge of state and non-state actors in relation to climate change, and
  low-carbon economic development.
• Demonstrated
  ability to build networks and communicate effectively with a wide range of
  stakeholders at different levels of seniority.
• Good
  knowledge and understanding of the local political economy and business
  operating context in Latin America, particularly in one or more of the
  Amazon Regional Fund countries (Bolivia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru) including
  socio-economic context and development challenges and priorities.
• Excellent
  organisational, inter-personal administration and communication skills.
• An
  ability to see both the big (strategic) picture, identifying opportunities
  for innovation and value addition for UK PACT, as well as keeping alert to
  project delivery risks.
• Professional
  fluency in English.
• Professional
  fluency in Spanish.
• A
  high degree of personal resilience, flexibility and ability to adapt to changing
  circumstances.
• Highly
  collaborative and committed to close working and open communication with
  colleagues in post and in the UK, and other UK PACT partners.
• Commitment
  to neutrality in all dealings with stakeholders, including political
  stakeholders, to build trusted relationships and ensure maximum
  effectiveness of the programme.

Equity, Diversity & Inclusion

Palladium is committed to embedding equity, diversity, and inclusion into
everything we do. We welcome applications from all sections of society and
actively encourage diversity to drive innovation, creativity, success and good
practice. We positively welcome and seek to ensure we achieve diversity in our
workforce; and that all job applicants and employees receive equal and fair
treatment regardless of their background or personal characteristics. These
include: (but are not limited to) socio-economic background, age, race, gender
identity and expression, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability,
nationality, veteran, marital or Indigenous status.

Should you require any adjustments or accommodations to be made due to a
disability or you are a neurodivergent individual or for any other
circumstance, please email our team at accessibility@thepalladiumgroup.com and
we will be in touch to discuss.

Safeguarding

We define Safeguarding as "the preventative action taken by Palladium to
protect our people, clients and the communities we work with from harm". We are
committed to ensuring that all children and adults who come into contact with
Palladium are treated with respect and are free from abuse. All successful
candidates will be subject to an enhanced selection process including
safeguarding-focused interviews and a rigorous due diligence process.