CAFF Job: Farmer Services Coordinator

Job Title: Farmer Services Coordinator

Location: Location flexible, ideally based in Sacramento, Davis, Santa Cruz, Salinas, Merced, or somewhere near those locations

FTE: Part Time – .8 FTE with the likelihood to move to 1 FTE

Rate: $21.63-22.60/hour ($45,000-47,000 annually)

FLSA: Non-Exempt

Reports To: Farmer Services Director

Application due: Applications received prior to December 21st, 2020 will be prioritized although applications will be accepted until 1/15/21.

Job Description:

The Community Alliance with Family Farmers (CAFF) is a non-profit organization whose mission is to build sustainable food and farming systems through policy advocacy and on-the-ground programs that create more resilient family farms, communities, and ecosystems. CAFF is a membership organization guided by a board of directors that includes family farmers and others who are passionate about food, farming and the environment. CAFF runs Regional Food Systems projects such as Farm to School projects, Ecological Farming campaigns, and providing technical assistance in accessing new markets for farmers around the state. Our main goals are to increase the economic viability of California family farmers and to connect communities with their local producers. See https://caff.org for more information.

POSITION SUMMARY

The Farmer Services Coordinator supports CAFF’s Farmer Services program, and specifically the Food Safety program by providing farmer trainings and leading our Partner Farm Program. CAFF offers a wide variety of food safety trainings to meet farmers where they are at and help guide them in improving their farm’s food safety practices. This position will help co-teach the Produce Safety Alliance Grower training with guidance from the Farmer Services Director. This position will provide FSMA 101 and basic GAPs trainings throughout the state with our local partners (Center for Land Based Learning, First Generation Farmers, and others); provide small group farmer trainings throughout the state; and manage the Food Safety Partner Farm Program. The Farmer Services Coordinator will meet with farmers, help them develop food safety action plans, guide them through completing them step by step, and organize farm field days. The vast majority of the time for this position will be spent “in-the-field” providing trainings to farmers and talking with them 1-on-1 and in small groups. This position will include a fair amount of travel especially during January-March. Additionally, this position will spend a small amount of their time on supporting our new food safety e-course and in other areas of the program. This position will also work with 15 farmers to record audio for 15 different podcast episodes. We work a Podcast Producer to turn the draft audio into a polished podcast episode for CAFF’s Podcast, The Farmers Beet. This position will start focused entirely on food safety technical assistance work to small farmers. It is likely that in the future the position would branch out into providing other farmer services such as support around fire resiliency, farm-tech solutions, and more.

MAJOR DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

QUALIFICATIONS

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

• Strong written and oral communication skills
• Resourceful and able to perform a variety of administrative and organizational tasks with a creative approach to problem solving
• Flexibility to work independently, with minimal supervision, as well as collaborate with others in a team setting
• Flexibility to work on a variety of projects
• Strong ability to multi-task
• Direct small-scale farming experience and/or farming knowledge
• Proficiency in Microsoft Office, especially Excel
• Familiarity with collaborative working platforms such as Salesforce, DropBox, and Google Drive is preferred

• Experience with Creative Adobe Suite preferred or other graphics software, preferred
• Experience with (or interest in learning) project management software Asana, preferred
• Bilingual in Spanish, preferred
• Connections to local growers in whatever part of the state you are based in, preferred
• Knowledge and formal training on Good Agricultural Practices, Food Safety Modernization Act, and 3rd Party Food Safety Audits, preferred

Physical Abilities

• Ability to sit for long periods of time working at a computer.
• Requires a full range of physical mobility, such as bending, stooping, lifting, turning, carrying objects, and grasping.
• Ability to spend sometimes a long time driving (up to six hours).

How to Apply

Send a one page cover letter answering the questions below:

•  What small-scale farming experience do you have?
• How would you rate your food safety knowledge on a scale of 1-10 (10 being expert).Why?
• If you could describe your approach towards work in one word what would it be?
•  Where would you be based for this position?
• Why are you interested in this position?
• Attach a 1 page resume to your cover letter

Attach them both to an email and send to kali@caff.org with the subject line: Farmer Services Coordinator

Other Notes:

• Active farmers that are looking for winter work are encouraged to apply.
• People with little food safety knowledge, but are willing to learn, are encouraged to apply.