ThaiNGO

Mekong Institute

Vacancy – SME & Trade Facilitation Specialist, Trade and Investment Facilitation Department, Mekong Institute, Khon Kaen, Thailand

Mekong Institute

Mekong Institute (MI) is a regional inter-governmental organization of the countries of the Greater Mekong Sub-region (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam, Thailand and China) established in 1996. The institute provides human resource development programs and services to GMS government agencies and private sector involved in various regional development and cooperation activities under the GMS Economic Cooperation Program. The institute holds the distinction of being the only GMS-based training and research institute, owned by the six GMS Governments, offering standard and on-demand human resource development programs with focus on regional cooperation and transnational development issues. The Institute is located in Khon Kaen, Thailand.

SME & Trade Facilitation Specialist, Communications and Knowledge Management Department

Mekong Institute (MI) seeks to recruit a SME & Trade Facilitation Specialist for its ongoing project on ‘Enhancing Competitiveness of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises in the Southern Economic Corridor (SEC) of the Mekong Sub-region. The project aims to enhance competitiveness of Small and Medium-sized enterprises to conduct cross border trade and investment and integrate into cross-border industrial clusters, regional and global value chain. The project duration is of two years duration and is being implemented in 19 provinces along the SEC in Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam.

The SME & Trade Facilitation Specialist works within the project as the core function in addition to other responsibilities as required, under the direct guidance of the Director, Trade and Investment Facilitation Department of Mekong Institute and overall supervision of the Executive Director of MI

Key task

• The SME & Trade Facilitation Specialist is responsible for providing technical guidance by designing and implementing capacity development activities planned under the project. This includes delivering technical session, preparing session plan and training materials, facilitating learning activities and making synthesis/evaluation of each training session/module.
• Plan, lead and coordinate learning programs, workshops and seminar under the project.
• Design and coordinate research delivery specifications to ensure that high quality research contents and methodologies are delivered.
• Develop/formulate new SME development and Trade facilitation project concept, project proposals and budget.
• In coordination with M&E officer, design evaluation form, survey questionnaire and administer monitoring and evaluation activities in the field.
• Make project mid-term & completion report, evaluation report and post capacity building follow up activities in accordance with MI standard and/or as required by the donor.
• Manage project operation and control assigned project budget
• Supervise and provide technical and administrative support to project staff
• Other related tasks as assigned by Director, Trade and Investment Facilitation or Executive Director of Mekong Institute.

Required qualifications, skills and experience

• Master Degree or PhD in Economics, Business/ Trade or related fields.
• Minimum 8 years of experience preferably in capacity building and training and/or research on SME development and Trade facilitation.
• Good understanding of issues related to SME development, WTO, Trade agreements, Trade Policy in the Greater Mekong Sub region and ASEAN economy.
• Proven experience in SME development, Trade capacity building and research.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills in written and verbal English.
• Those working in government may also apply on secondment basis through proper channel.

If you have the skills and experience to exceed in this position, and are passionate about equitable and inclusive economic growth in GMS, please send your CV and cover letter, to hr@mekonginstitute.org by 30^th January 2017, titled ‘SME Specialist’.

Please note that only applications successful in progressing to the next stage will be responded to.