Senior Officer – Data for Decision Making At Blue Ventures

Location: Either in one of our global offices (Bristol or London – UK, Belize, Timor-Leste) or home-based within countries where Blue Ventures has administrative capacity (Mozambique, Kenya, Tanzania)

Closing date for applications: 16th December 2023

Contract status: Global Post, Full-time

Start date: As soon as possible

Contract duration: 2 years fixed term (with the possibility of extension)

Remuneration: Competitive salary based on experience as per national salary range at Senior Officer level

Salary Band: Senior Officer

We rebuild tropical fisheries with coastal communities

Blue Ventures is a marine conservation organisation that puts people first. We support coastal fishers in remote and rural communities to rebuild fisheries, restore ocean life and build lasting pathways to prosperity. Our work began two decades ago in Madagascar’s remote coastal communities and is growing globally. Across a dozen countries, we’re partnering with traditional fishers and community organisations to design, scale, strengthen and sustain fisheries management and conservation at the community level. We bring partners together in networks to advocate for reform, and share tools and best practices to support fishing communities across the globe.

Summary job description

Our Technical Knowledge team oversees Blue Ventures’ technical pillars (Secure Rights, Community-Based Fisheries Management, Better Returns, Financial Inclusion, and the crosscutting theme of Gender) and supports the use of data for decision-making, providing tools, training, and guidance to partners and Blue Ventures’ staff around the world. This team integrates expertise and deep practical experience with pragmatism and a desire to enable others to deliver lasting change, by distilling global best practices and knowledge into usable tools, appropriate training, and responsive guidance and support. The team is also responsible for delivering peer learning exchanges and knowledge-sharing events both online and face-to-face across the organisation, in addition to overseeing technical publications.

We are currently recruiting for an exceptional individual to join this global team, supporting field teams, partners and coastal communities to collect, manage, analyse and visualise data to inform fisheries and ecosystem management. With support from the broader Technical Knowledge and Organisational Monitoring & Evaluation teams, this individual will be responsible for populating and maintaining a global spatial database linking communities and LMMAs with their associated data. They will also be responsible for mapping the extent of reef, seagrass and mangroves within the global network of LMMAs we support using best available datasets, and supporting colleagues in communicating and interpreting these findings.

The Blue Ventures Technical Knowledge team has a unique vantage point, gained through supporting dozens of partners working with hundreds of communities across South East Asia, the Western Indian Ocean, West Africa, and the Caribbean, as well as being part of international fora and members of expert panels. As such, our technical team plays a key role in identifying, collating, sharing, and transferring key insights and successful approaches, updating information, training, tools, and guidance around the world, and building a community of practice around each of the pillar themes.

At the heart of Blue Ventures’ 2030 strategy is an unwavering commitment to empowering communities through participatory collection, feedback, and use of fisheries and ecological data for adaptive management, and playing a leadership role in our sector to make this the norm. Over the next few years we are continuing to build and improve our spatial data to strengthen our ability to interpret changes to the fisheries and ecosystems where we work.

The Senior Officer – Data for Decision Making will support the Technical Knowledge team in ensuring there is accurate and reliable spatial data to inform conservation decision making across all pillars of our work. The candidate will have a background in managing spatial data within international environmental contexts, and ideally have knowledge of fisheries ecology. They must have an excellent understanding of geographic information systems, and technical experience of managing spatial databases with a good understanding of data system processes. The candidate will be confident in using ecological data for analyses and reporting, producing outputs for a range of different audiences, including running statistical analysis. You should be confident and have experience in communicating scientific methodological concepts, tools and processes, in a simple way for non-technical audiences.

Blue Ventures recognises the key roles that women play in fisheries management and conservation as fishers, gleaners, processors, sellers, and negotiators and seeks to highlight the important value of their roles in fisheries governance, that are often invisible, so that they also benefit. An understanding of the challenges faced, particularly by women in fisheries, and experience working in communities to find some practical solutions are desirable for this role.

The successful candidate will have an understanding of the complex challenges facing coastal communities monitoring their fisheries and coastal ecosystems. They will thrive in environments that are dynamic, fast-paced, collegiate, and ambitious; they will have a proven track record in distilling complexity into easily interpretable material, be able to deliver high-impact written work, and communicate effectively with diverse audiences, ranging from fishing communities to practitioners, academic institutions, governments, and other technical experts.

The role will support interdisciplinary and international teams in building, maintaining and interpreting their data. This position will report to the Manager – Data for Decision Making, and will be based in one of our regional hubs, with regular overseas travel to work with partners and teams around the world.

To download the full job description please click here.