Director of International Programmes

 

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About Bonsucro

Bonsucro is the leading global sustainability platform and standard for sugarcane, one of the world’s most important crops. Our purpose is to collectively accelerate the sustainable production and uses of sugarcane.

We convene over 270 members from more than 50 countries to addresscritical challenges in the sugarcane sector and drive both performance and impact through our system of sustainability standards. We work across all sugarcane products and derivatives – sugar, ethanol, molasses, and bagasse in traditional and newer market sectors, from sugar and alcohol to biofuels and bioplastics.

Bonsucro is ISEAL Code Compliant. Our system has been independently evaluated against ISEAL’s Codes of Good Practice––a globally recognised framework for effective, credible sustainability systems.

In 2021, we published a new strategic plan that reflects our confidence in the future of sustainable sugarcane and the contribution we will make to the UN Global Goals and climate action.

The strategy sets out our ambitions to collectively accelerate the sustainable production and uses of sugarcane through three strategic aims:

• Create shared value across the supply chain
• Improve the environmental impact of sugarcane
• Strengthen human rights and decent work in sugarcane farming and milling.

These aims are underpinned by six main activities: certification and assurance, impact projects, membership development, market development, digitisation, and communications. We will use the combined strength of our global membership to create a powerful force for change.

The Role

Working for a dynamic, purposeful, multi-stakeholder organisation you will play a pivotal role in the Bonsucro mission to collectively accelerate the sustainable production and uses of sugarcane and the success of the ambitious new five year strategic plan. Founded ten years ago, Bonsucro is the most widely adopted standard for sustainable sugarcane and is undergoing an exciting time of expansion and opportunity.

The Director of International Programmes is a new role created to lead, develop and work within and across the regional teams to maximise their collective impact and deliver on the objectives of the Bonsucro Strategic Plan 2021-26. Reporting to the CEO, the Director of International Programmes sits on the Senior Management Team (SMT) and has a key role devising and driving the strategies, programmes and partnerships for Bonsucro’s work in Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia, and Africa; including securing and mobilising resources and making key decisions to drive success of the organisation and its people.

STRATEGY AND EXECUTION

• Lead the development and delivery of the regional and departmental plans, partnerships, and programmes, to deliver targets and measurable impacts in
  accordance with the strategic plan, working to agreed timescales and budgets.
• Coordinate across, and within, the regional teams to manage alignment, prioritisation, resourcing and knowledge-sharing
• Execute the scaling up of Bonsucro’s organisational capacity in key sugarcane origins and support delivery of the wider organisation’s growth plans
• Undertake a leadership role on thematic cross-cutting work, as and when required, to deliver the strategic objectives.
• Bring focus on impact, working closely with the Monitoring and Evaluation function to embed strong systems and impact measurement in Bonsucro’s international programmes.

INNOVATION

• Support cross-organisation efforts to further digitise Bonsucro products and services and strengthen internal systems, including proper stewardship of data policies.
• Lead and support the department to facilitate a learning culture and identify, evaluate and pilot innovations with potential to scale up and accelerate action on climate change, regenerative agriculture, water, smallholders, and workers’ rights.

FUNDING

• Lead and direct efforts to secure funding from donor grants and partnerships to meet the income targets for impact projects (> £1 million p.a. from grants and credit trading)
• Overall responsibility for managing the Bonsucro Impact Fund and reporting on the impact of its grant-making in accordance with the organisational and donor policies and procedure.
• Working collectively to update the funding strategy and significantly increase and diversify the income pipeline through membership fees, consultancy, events, training, credit trading, and developing new data and analytical products.

PEOPLE MANAGEMENT

• Leading by example, to maintain a positive working environment and culture in accordance with the core Bonsucro principles of inclusiveness, adaptability, collaboration, and credibility.
• Lead and manage the department to achieve the strategic goals and departmental KPI’s in adherence with organisational culture, learning and core principles.
• Provide regular, consistent and timely coaching, feedback, guidance, and direction as needed: ensure that this culture trickles down through the direct report managers to the all staff.

STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT – MAKING A DIFFERENCE

• Motivate, inspire and support the regional teams to engage stakeholders and members in order to achieve targets for membership recruitment, retention, and certification, and increase the number of smallholder farmers reached by Bonsucro.
• Represent Bonsucro externally with other senior leaders, to build the profile and influence of the organisation, and to negotiate new partnerships.

REPORTING & LEARNING

• Monitor risks on an on-going basis and highlight exceptions and risk immediately to the CEO and Finance Risk Manager and proactively propose solutions to mitigate these and stimulate organisational learning
• Provide timely updates to the CEO on relevant aspects of the department work plan, including submissions for quarterly CEO reports and prepare recommendations and inputs to the Board and Members Council meetings
• Work together with the Director of Corporate Services and take ownership of the departmental budget planning and proper management and liaise with the Finance team to conduct monthly reviews of departmental expenditure and annual/quarterly budgeting.
• Responsible for managing delivery of quality and timely reports for organisational learning and to donors for projects and partnerships delivered by the International Programme department.

ESSENTIAL CRITERIA

• A collaborative and inclusive leader with extensive senior management experience and expertise in an international role
• Demonstrable understanding and experience of sustainable agriculture issues in the regions where Bonsucro works
• Experience of leading a portfolio of relevant complex operations in developing countries to deliver sustainability goals.
• Track record in securing significant funding from donors/investors for impact projects
• Excellent communication skills and a proven ability to engage a diversity of stakeholders and to motivate and bring others along
• Proven ability to deliver multiple priorities in a complex and resource-constrained context
• Knowledge and experience in at least two of the following thematic priorities: climate action, water stewardship, biodiversity/ regenerative agriculture, human rights, decent work, living wage, smallholder farming.
• Strong financial management, planning and project management skills.
• Fluent in written and spoken English
• University degree in relevant subject – high level of intellect and competency
• Demonstrated commitment to the mission and principles of Bonsucro

DESIRABLE CRITERIA

• Post-graduate in agriculture, environmental science, or another relevant subject.
• Networks within the global sustainable agriculture and sugar industry.
• Ability to speak other languages, in particular Portuguese and Spanish

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