The Fairtrade Foundation Job Description

The Fairtrade Foundation
Job Description
Job Title: Producer Partnerships Manager
Reports to: Producer Relations Manager
Staff Reporting: (Management of consultants may be required)
Based: London – with occasional overseas travel
Background
The Fairtrade Foundation is a passionate and ambitious development organisation
committed to tackling poverty and injustice through trade. We are best known as the
independent, not-for-profit body behind the FAIRTRADE Mark, a product label assuring
consumers that their purchase helps disadvantaged farmers and workers in developing
countries secure a better deal.
We undertake our certification and product labelling work as the UK member of Fairtrade
Labelling Organisations International (FLO), a global network of organisations working to
common standards and verification systems. We are one of the largest and fastest growing
of the 21 labelling initiatives in FLO, working with hundreds of companies on
thousands of products that generated sales of almost £500 million in 2007.
The Foundation is also responsible for building support for Fairtrade across society and
bringing together producers and consumers in a citizens’ movement for change. The growing
number of Fairtrade towns and cities, faith communities and schools and universities are a
testament to the efforts of our grass-roots supporter networks.
In the UK, the Foundation employs over 70 staff across five distinct areas: Certification,
Commercial Relations, Communications, Finance & Resources (including Fundraising,
IT, Human Resources and Administration) and Policy & Producer Relations.
The Producer Relations Team within the Fairtrade Foundation works to extend the benefits
of Fairtrade to more disadvantaged producers, especially from Least Developed Countries
(LCD’s) creating opportunities and facilitating support to link them to the UK Fairtrade
market.
Purpose of the Job
To support producer organisations already in the system to sell more under Fairtrade
conditions, as well as developing opportunities to open the door to Fairtrade for more farmers
and workers, particularly the most marginalised from least developed countries.
Key tasks
1. Develop and manage strategic partnerships in order to identify, prepare and link
farmers and workers from least developed countries to Fairtrade market
opportunities.
2. Facilitate and manage access to capacity building and technical support for
producers supplying the UK market in order to increase security of supply and

maximise producer benefits from this trade, ensuring this work is monitored and
prioritised according to trends in the operations of Fairtrade certification on-theground.
3. Work closely with the Commercial Relations Team to support identification and
certification of Fairtrade supply chains integral to projected market growth and new
business opportunities; ensuring that this work is planned and executed to reflect the
Foundation’s long-term development goals.
4. To provide an advisory service to the Commercial Relations Team on the wider
Fairtrade Labelling system’s work with producer organisations, including the FLO
Producer Business Unit’s services and FLO CERT procedures to support and
influence their account management work with licensees and traders
5. Work with colleagues at FLO -CERT, FLO e. V and the Fairtrade Foundation to
develop and strengthen Fairtrade information systems to promote a more efficient
and effective flow of information about producers, particularly in support the work of
the Foundation’s Communications and Commercial Relations teams.
6. Support the broader work of the Fairtrade Foundation in the delivery of its Tipping the
Balance strategy for 2008-2012 to ambitiously scale up the growth of Fairtrade and its
benefits to producers.
Person Specification
Required Experience
1. First-hand experience of the challenges facing primary producers from developing
countries in accessing commercial markets in the UK, and developing solutions to enable
sustainable market access.
2. Solid experience of effective cross-cultural partnership-working with a wide range or
actors (government agencies, service providers, export promotion agencies, donors,
producer organizations and traders) including developing creative working relationships.
3. A track record of success and achievement in designing and managing complex projects.
4. Working in an organisation where the needs of multiple stakeholders must be considered
and balanced as part of the project process.
5. Track record for responsibility and effective management of budget and expenditure.
6. Working in a fast paced environment.
Knowledge, skills and abilities
1. Knowledge of fair trade and/or development issues.
2. An effective project manager with the ability to develop, lead and motivate project teams.
3. Ability to generate, encourage and implement innovative solutions; to foster a “can do”
culture.

4. Excellent communication and presentation skills including the ability to network effectively
demonstrating tact where necessary.
5. Demonstrate well-developed interpersonal skills and the ability to maintain positive
working relationships at all levels of seniority, both internally and with external
stakeholders.
6. Demonstrate a structured approach to work and effective time management skills
including the ability to juggle competing priorities to meet deadlines.
7. A strong team player with a flexible approach and willingness to engage with a wide
range of diverse and complex issues in the achievement of the Fairtrade Foundations
objectives.
8. Good understanding of MS Office programmes (Outlook, Word, Access, PowerPoint,
Excel).
9. Willingness to travel overseas occasionally.
Desirable
10. Experience of working with small-scale producers in the developing world.
11. Understanding of sustainable supply chains within the context of international
development including experience of mainstream retail supply chains.
12. Working knowledge of French & Spanish.
13. Knowledge of certification systems or procedures.
14. Database management experience; such as use of Access and/ or mySQL
15. Demonstrate awareness of the Vision and Values of the Fairtrade Foundation.

Terms and Conditions
Post: Producer Partnerships Manager
Location: The Fairtrade Foundation, premises in London or if required at
another location or office to be able to carry out the duties of
the post
Contract: Permanent contract is offered after successful completion of
probationary period
Salary: £29,000 - £32,150
Hours: 35 hours Monday to Friday, flexitime is worked around core
hours of 10.30 to 16.00. Hours worked in agreement with your
line manager. Overtime payments are not normally made
although time of in lieu will normally be given where excess
hours are worked
Some travel may be involved.
Probation Period: All new appointments are subject to a probationary period of 6
months
Holidays: The holiday leave year runs from 1 January - 31 December.
Holiday entitlement for full-time employees is 25 days per
annum, plus three days between Christmas and New Year
(pro-rata for part-time employees)
Holiday entitlement increases by 5 days after completion of 5
years continuous service by the beginning of the new Fairtrade
Foundation leave year which runs from 1 January - 31
December
Pension: Optional contributory pension scheme
(sliding scale up to a maximum 6- 10% by employer,
dependent on employee contribution from 1% - 5%)
Health Care: Corporate cover via Benenden Health is available to all staff
Training: All staff have access to appropriate training
Season Ticket/Bike Loan: An interest free season ticket or bike loan facility is available to
all permanent staff

Home Computers: An interest free loan to purchase home computers is available
to all permanent staff
Childcare Vouchers: The Fairtrade Foundation operates a childcare voucher salary
sacrifice scheme whereby you can sacrifice some of your gross
salary to buy vouchers for childcare. This can be financially
valuable to you as you don’t have to pay tax or National
Insurance contributions on the value of the vouchers
Bike Purchase Scheme: This is similar to the Childcare Salary Sacrifice Scheme above,
which offers employees the opportunity to make savings in
respect of income tax and national insurance contributions on
the cost of purchasing a bicycle to ride to work
Healthy lifestyle: The Fairtrade Foundation will provide a basket of fresh and
dried fruit at the office once a week
Access: There is access for people with disabilities by way of a
passenger lift to our second floor offices
Smoking Policy: The Fairtrade Foundation has a non-smoking policy throughout
the organisation
Equal Opportunities: The Fairtrade Foundation is an equal opportunities employer.
We aim to ensure that no employee, job applicant, or volunteer
receives less favourable treatment because of their colour,
race, nationality or ethnic or national origins, class, sex, sexual
orientation, age, religious beliefs, marital status, family situation
or disability
Selection criteria and procedures will be regularly reviewed to
ensure that individuals are treated on the basis of their relevant
merits and abilities. All employees will be given equal
opportunity and access to training (within the limited funds
available)
The Foundation is committed to making the policy effective and
will bring it to the attention of all employees, applicants and
volunteers. Anyone working with or for the Foundation is
expected to abide by the spirit of this policy. A detailed
implementation guide will be made available to anyone working
for the Foundation in any capacity

Application Procedure
For more information and an application form (CV’s will not be accepted) please visit the jobs
section at www.fairtrade.org.uk, or e-mail jobs@fairtrade.org.uk
Completed application should be e-mailed to jobs@fairtrade.org.uk (Word or Rich Text
Format) at any time during the recruitment process or posted to:
Human Resources Officer, The Fairtrade Foundation, 3 rd Floor, Ibex House, 42 – 47 Minories
London EC3N 1DY (from Monday 13 th October 2008).
Please note that we are moving office to Ibex House and therefore postal applications
should not arrive before Monday 13 th October as we cannot accept responsibility for
any documents which are sent to the premises before we take up occupation
While we are happy to accept e-mail applications we cannot be responsible for the quality of
copy obtained.
The deadline for applications is: Friday 17 th October 2008 (10.00am) Late applications
will not be accepted.
1 st round interviews will be held on: 3 rd and 5 th November 2008
2 nd round interviews will be held on 10 th November 2008
If you have not heard from us two weeks after the closing date, then you have been
unsuccessful on this occasion. We are very sorry but we are unable to write to unsuccessful
applicants due to the sheer volume of applications and limited resources we currently have
available.
However, thank you for your interest in working for the Foundation.