Internal Call- Consultant Multifunctional Landscape at the Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), Ethiopia

The Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT)   (www.bioversityinternational.org)   delivers   research-based   solutions   that   harness agricultural biodiversity and sustainably transform food systems to improve people’s lives. Alliance solutions address the global crisis of malnutrition, climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental degradation.

With novel partnerships, the Alliance generates evidence and mainstream innovations to transform food systems and landscapes so that they sustain the planet, drive prosperity, and nourish people in a climate crisis.

The Alliance is part of CGIAR, a global research partnership for a food-secure future.

Natural and human-induced hazards are becoming increasingly complex global challenges, particularly due to the growing interactions among multiple hazards and their cascading impacts on lives, livelihoods, ecosystems, and infrastructure. Multi-hazards such as landslides, flooding, erosion, droughts, and sedimentation are strongly interconnected landscape processes that are intensified by environmental degradation, climate variability, rapid urbanization, deforestation, and unsustainable land management practices. Addressing these risks requires integrated and systemic approaches that move beyond isolated hazard assessments toward resilience-oriented landscape management.

Ethiopia is among the most hazard-prone countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, facing recurrent disasters that threaten agricultural systems, infrastructure, water resources, and vulnerable communities. The Omo-Ghibe Basin exemplifies these challenges, where landslides, erosion, siltation, floods, and droughts increasingly affect both highland and lowland areas. The basin also hosts major hydropower developments that are highly vulnerable to sedimentation and land degradation. Population pressure, deforestation, unmanaged runoff, and expansion of settlements into fragile terrains further exacerbate ecosystem instability and disaster risks.

Current interventions in Ethiopia largely focus on emergency response or isolated hazard-specific solutions, with limited emphasis on integrated risk governance, root-cause analysis, and long-term resilience building. Existing studies are often restricted to GIS- and remote sensing-based susceptibility mapping without translating findings into actionable multi-hazard management strategies. There is therefore a critical need for science-based, landscape-scale approaches that integrate hazard understanding, ecosystem restoration, infrastructure protection, and community resilience.

The Multifunctional Landscape (MFL) approach provides a suitable framework to address these challenges by integrating ecological restoration, sustainable land management, climate resilience, and socio-economic development objectives across interconnected landscapes. Through coordinated planning and implementation, the MFL lens can support risk-informed land use management, restoration of degraded ecosystems, reduction of erosion and sediment transport, and enhancement of adaptive capacity across communities and institutions.

Within this context, Enhanced Rock Weathering (ERW) presents an innovative complementary intervention that can strengthen the resilience and sustainability objectives of the MFL framework. ERW accelerates the natural weathering of silicate rocks to remove atmospheric carbon dioxide while improving soil health and agricultural productivity. In tropical environments such as the Omo-Ghibe Basin, warm and humid conditions can enhance silicate dissolution, making ERW particularly promising.

Beyond carbon sequestration, ERW can improve soil fertility, increase drought resilience, enhance soil organic carbon stabilization, and reduce dependence on expensive imported fertilizers. These co-benefits align strongly with landscape restoration, climate adaptation, and sustainable agricultural intensification objectives under the MFL approach. In addition, ERW may create opportunities for climate finance through voluntary carbon markets, while contributing to broader environmental benefits such as mitigation of downstream acidification impacts.

The proposed initiative therefore aims to integrate multi-hazard risk management, ecosystem restoration, and climate-smart land management through an MFL framework in the Omo-Ghibe Basin, while exploring the potential of ERW as a nature-based solution that simultaneously supports resilience, agricultural sustainability, and carbon removal.

The Multifunctional Landscape (MFL) Team of the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, in collaboration with national and local partners, aims to advance an integrated and science-based multi-hazard risk management approach in Ethiopia’s Omo-Ghibe Basin. The initiative seeks to move beyond fragmented emergency-response interventions toward a long-term landscape resilience framework that addresses interconnected hazards such as landslides, flooding, erosion, and siltation. The team will support the development of a comprehensive multi-hazard database, vulnerability and exposure mapping, and integrated risk assessments to inform evidence-based decision-making. In parallel, the initiative will design and implement nature-based and climate-smart solutions, including landscape restoration, sustainable land management, and innovative approaches such as Enhanced Rock Weathering (ERW), to strengthen ecosystem stability, agricultural resilience, and community adaptive capacity. A central component of the work will be the establishment of a demonstration and learning landscape that can serve as a scalable model for integrated multi-hazard resilience management in Ethiopia.

• Review, catalog and document existing data and information on multi-hazard risks and their effects (environmental, economic and social) focusing on building a comprehensive framework for managing multi-hazard risks (such flooding, landslides, and erosion) through a combination of data collection, policy analysis, and community engagement.

• Production of multi-hazard susceptibility maps. This shall be done through multi-hazard identification, characterization and mapping to produce through detailed inventory and evaluations of the existing situations related to multi-hazards (landslides, erosion, siltation, flooding, etc) in the basin. These shall include but not limited to identifications of the key drivers and triggers of multi-hazards in each of the sites: such as lithology, terrains parameters, hydrology (surface and groundwater), conditions of drainage networks, road constructions, etc.

• Multi-hazard risk mapping and analysis. This will involve creating multi-hazard risk maps by combining the hazard data with exposure and vulnerability assessments. The vulnerability analysis and mapping shall include identification, analysis and mapping of sensitivity of the biophysical and socioeconomic sectors to the impacts of multi-hazards including physical vulnerability, socio-economic vulnerability and environmental vulnerability.

• Co-design of multi-hazard risk management interventions and performance evaluations that are cognizant of local context (biophysical, social dynamics and local governance arrangements) for promoting proper multi-hazard risk management. It should focus on how community interactions, narratives, aspirations, social dynamics, cultural factors and governance structures shape the adoption and scaling approaches against different degrees of risks and fragilities.

• Knowledge creation, dissemination and management, and capacity building focus on scaling up multi-hazard risk management by converting technical evaluations into actionable, widespread strategies through knowledge sharing and multi-level governance.

• Policy options, institutional arrangements, and regulatory frameworks that promote multi-hazard risk management by sensitizing policy makers and development agencies on the importance of policy instruments, institutional arrangements, and regulatory frameworks in promoting proper multi-hazard risk management.

• Establishment of “multi-hazard risk management” working group in Ethiopia to review the current state of multi-hazard risk related research, training/education, capacity building, practice, policy and institutional aspects in Ethiopia as well as identify major gaps in awareness, research, innovations, capacity building, technology adoption, etc. on multi-hazard risk management at national level.

• Produce a working paper on “Approaches to Multi-hazard risk management in Ethiopia which could influence policy, practice, trainings and future research in Ethiopia, and plan and implement demand driven capacity building, training, awareness creation activities to different actors and sectors including the general public.

• Spatial Assessment and Mapping of Basalt Resources for ERW Potential

• Technical Support for ERW Agronomic Trial Implementation and Analysis

• Multi-hazard risk assessment and geomorphological hazard management.

• Landslide modelling and hazard management.

• Integrated water harvesting and landscape-based land management.

• Systems thinking to analyse terrain instability, hydrology, and flooding.

• Advanced academic degree (Master’s or Ph.D.) in Geo-engineering or a closely related interdisciplinary field.

• Recognized scientific authority demonstrated through extensive published research or field-based engagement.

• High-level fluency in English to deliver complex technical and policy documentation.

• Extensive applied scientific experience managing complex terrains across Sub-Saharan Africa.

• Proven track record of advanced hazard modelling with practical, landscape-scale resilience interventions.

• Long-standing engagement working with multinational institutions, government institutions, infrastructure agencies, and local community stakeholders.

• In depth knowledge of the multifunctional landscape approaches.

The Consultant will be reporting to Scientist II-Multifunctional Landscapes via email and biweekly virtual meetings

Applicants are invited to visit https://www.bioversityinternational.org/jobs/ to get full details of the position and to submit their applications. Applications MUST include reference number Ref: CONSULTANT – MULTIFUNCTIONAL LANDSCAPE as the position applied for. Application and CV should be saved as one document using the candidate’s last name, first name for ease of sorting.

Note: The Alliance does not charge a fee at any stage of the recruitment process (application, interview meeting, processing or training). The Alliance also does not concern itself with information on applicants’ bank accounts.

Applications closing date: 26 May 2026

Please note that email applications will not be considered.

Only short-listed candidates will be contacted.

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