Youth Enterprise Development and Inclusive Finance Specialist

POSITION ANNOUNCEMENT – INTERNAL/EXTERNAL

Youth Enterprise Development and Inclusive Finance Specialist

REF: YEDIF/REAP/025/2026              

The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) seeks to recruit a Youth Enterprise Development and Inclusive Finance Specialist who leads three inter-connected areas of REAP Ethiopia: youth entrepreneurship incubation, market system development , and access to appropriate finance. The role will help aspiring entrepreneurs and existing youth-led and youth-employing enterprises establish, stabilise and grow viable businesses in feed and related livestock value chains, generating sustained income and dignified and fulfilling work.

ILRI is a member of the CGIAR, a global research alliance that works to transform food, land and water systems in a climate crisis and is the only CGIAR centre dedicated to addressing multiple development challenges through sustainable livestock solutions.

REAP is a five-year multi-country initiative intended to advance education and relieve poverty by enabling 1,000,000 financially disadvantaged young women and men, aged 18 to 35 years, to access new work opportunities in sustainable feed and livestock value chains across the seven countries. The Program will equip young people with technical, entrepreneurial, financial; digital and workplace capabilities linked to real economic opportunities and enable financially disadvantaged young people to access work, finance, productive assets, markets and income-generating opportunities that improve household resilience and wellbeing. Among its participants, the Program shall target 70% young women and at least 5% youth with disabilities and 20,000 refugees and displaced young people.

The programme will support youth-led and youth-inclusive enterprises to enter, stabilise and grow in feed and livestock markets; strengthen market systems, services, and commercial relationships; and improve policy, finance, innovation, extension, and other enabling systems required for youth-led enterprises to succeed and generate additional employment opportunities. Across these areas, it applies gender-transformative and inclusive approaches to address restrictive gender and social norms, reduce barriers to young women’s participation, and strengthen their agency, voice, leadership and access to resources and opportunities. Safeguarding measures are embedded throughout the programme to protect young people from harm and support their safe participation.

Led by ILRI, the consortium includes ICARDA, IITA, the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, and icipe, working with downstream delivery partners, enterprise-support organisations, financial institutions, government and private sector actors. The Director draws on partners’ expertise in feed and livestock systems, enterprise development, market systems, inclusive finance, digital innovation, policy, and gender and social inclusion to guide country delivery and achieve measurable youth work outcomes, adapting implementation in response to evidence.

Working through downstream partners and across the consortium, the postholder will guide incubation and business development services, strengthen financial capability and investment readiness, and develop partnerships with financial service providers to facilitate suitable financing for youth enterprises, in line with REAP’s overall access-to-finance approach. The Specialist will focus on enterprise capability, market opportunity identification, commercial linkages, suitable financing and partner performance, ensuring that youth enterprises respond to demonstrated demand and participate sustainably in feed and livestock market systems.

Key Responsibilities:

Strategy and country delivery

• Lead costed country plans for entrepreneurship, incubation and inclusive finance, aligning partner responsibilities and support packages with programme guidance and youth work outcomes.
• Use market and technical evidence to prioritise viable enterprise models and differentiated support pathways; coordinate consortium inputs and advise the Country Lead on delivery bottlenecks and adaptations.
• Identify market-system constraints and opportunities affecting youth participation, and translate them into enterprise-development plans that strengthen market access, services, partnerships and financing.

Youth entrepreneurship and incubation

• Guide enterprise profiling and pathway matching based on skills, assets, maturity, constraints and growth potential, aligned with approved financing windows. Refer participants to other work pathways where entrepreneurship is unsuitable.
• Design and oversee partner-delivered incubation, business development services, mentoring and coaching for start-ups, existing businesses, groups and cooperatives.
• Ensure support builds practical business capability in costing, pricing, cash flow, records, governance, operations and formalisation, and assess whether enterprises are progressing towards viability beyond programme support.

Market System Development and Commercial Linkage

• Identify viable market opportunities and address key constraints affecting youth participation in feed and livestock value chains.
• Facilitate sustainable commercial linkages between youth enterprises, buyers, suppliers, processors and other market actors.
• Develop and validate commercially viable business models and use market evidence to guide their adaptation, scaling or discontinuation.

Financial Capability, Investment Readiness and Access to Finance

• Strengthen enterprises’ financial capability and investment readiness, assess financing needs, and maintain a pipeline of finance-ready enterprises matched to suitable financial products.
• Identify and engage suitable financial service providers and partners, and develop appropriate financing options, including working capital, leasing, asset finance, value-chain finance and risk-sharing mechanisms.
• Address financing barriers for young women and underserved youth, and coordinate financing roll-out, referrals and monitoring of uptake, repayment and performance with relevant partners.

Inclusive enterprise, market systems and financing pathways

• Work with gender and inclusion colleagues to address barriers involving collateral, documentation, assets, mobility, care responsibilities, disability and control over income; avoid selection that favours only better-capitalised participants.
• Embed safeguarding, safe work and participant feedback in enterprise, market systems and finance support, preventing unsuitable debt and excessive risk transfer while promoting agency and sustainable income.

Partner leadership and performance

• Assess incubation, business-development, market systems development and financing partners; define results and quality standards, strengthen capacity, review delivery and recommend corrective action to the Country Lead.
• Coordinate with feed systems, digital and inclusion teams so enterprise and financing support responds to demonstrated market opportunities and technical requirements.

Evidence and adaptive learning

• Work with MEL and finance partners to track enterprise survival, sales, profitability, financing performance and sustained youth work, distinguishing services delivered from verified outcomes.
• Use enterprise, market system and financing evidence to improve support packages, assess product effectiveness, recommend scaling or discontinuation, and share practical lessons with the country team and programme leads

Academic and professional qualifications:

Education:

• Master’s degree or PhD in finance, marketing, agribusiness, business administration, entrepreneurship, economics, agricultural economics, development studies or a related field.

Desirable

• Professional training in incubation, market system development, MSME finance, inclusive finance, investment readiness or enterprise coaching.

Experience:

• Master’s degree with ten years or PhD with five years of progressively responsible experience, with demonstrated responsibility in both enterprise development, incubation, market system development and access to finance.
• Proven experience designing or leading incubation, business development services, mentoring or accelerator programmes, supporting enterprises from start-up through stabilisation and growth.
• Demonstrated experience building financial partnerships and facilitating suitable financing for micro and small enterprises, including investment readiness, financial projections and enterprise pipelines.
• Strong understanding of enterprise viability, cash flow, financing needs, product suitability and responsible lending; experience assessing financing outcomes with financial service providers.
• Experience adapting enterprise and finance support for young women and economically  disadvantaged youth, managing delivery partners, supervising staff and using performance evidence to improve results.
• Demonstrated experience in market systems and value-chain analysis, developing commercially viable business models, and facilitating sustainable partnerships and market linkages that expand opportunities for micro and small enterprises.
• Substantial experience in Ethiopia, with understanding of agricultural enterprises, market systems and the financial ecosystem.
• Excellent written and spoken English for technical exchange, partner coordination and reporting.
• Experience adapting enterprise and financing support to barriers affecting young women and underserved youth.
• Experience with large-scale youth entrepreneurship or employment programmes, particularly young women’s economic participation

Desirable

• Experience with feed, livestock or rural enterprises.
• Experience with savings groups, informal businesses, cooperatives, leasing, guarantees, value-chain or Islamic finance; experience in Morocco or other North African contexts.
• Familiarity with Mastercard Foundation approaches to Youth in Work and Dignified and Fulfilling Work, and with research-for-development organisations.

Skills:

• Knowledge of theoretical concepts / principles and their context.
• Strong commercial judgement and analytical skills, including interpretation of cash flow, enterprise performance and financing risk.
• Strong negotiation, coaching and partnership-management skills, with the ability to explain business and financing concepts to diverse audiences.
• Ability to coordinate across institutions and technical disciplines, manage competing priorities and present clear, evidence-based recommendations.

Duty Station:   Addis Ababa Ethiopia

Grade:  HG 18

Minimum Base Salary:  USD 3,094 per month. 

Terms of appointment:  This is a National Staff (NS) position, initial appointment is for three years with the possibility of renewal, contingent upon individual performance and the availability of funding. The ILRI remuneration package for nationally recruited staff in Ethiopia includes a very competitive salary and benefits such as life and medical insurance, offshore pension plan, etc. The ILRI campus is set in a secure, attractive campus in Addis Ababa. Dining and sports facilities are located on site.

Applications: Applicants should provide a cover letter and curriculum vitae; names and addresses (including telephone and email) of three referees who are knowledgeable about the candidate’s professional qualifications and work experience to be included in the curriculum vitae. The position and reference number: REF: YEDIF/REAP/025/2026 sould be clearly indicated in the subject line of the cover letter. All applications to be submitted online on our recruitment portal: http://ilri.simplicant.com/ on or before 23 November 2026.  

ILRI does not charge a fee at any stage of the recruitment process (application, interview meeting, processing or training).

Suitably qualified women are particularly encouraged to apply.

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To find out more about working at ILRI visit our website at http://www.ilri.org/

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