Program Accountant

The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) seeks to recruit a Program Accountant to provide financial management and accounting support to the REAP Program, ensuring accurate financial reporting, effective budget management, compliance with Mastercard Foundation and ILRI requirements, and strong financial oversight of program activities and implementing partners. The role supports financial planning, monitoring, donor reporting, risk management, and the delivery of timely financial information to facilitate informed decision-making and successful program implementation.

ILRI is an international organisation working for better lives and better planet through livestock. ILRI’s mission emphasises the interconnections between people, animals, and the environment, aiming to improve the lives of more than 300 million people in low- and middle-income countries through livestock science that supports equitable and resilient livestock systems, ultimately contributing to food systems transformation with climate and environmental benefits. This mission is delivered through two core strategic objectives: co-designing and deploying sustainable, science-based livestock solutions, and leveraging science to inform and influence policy and investment decisions.

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.

About the program: 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.

• Maintain complete and accurate accounting records for assigned REAP countries, workstreams, partners and cost categories, ensuring transactions are recorded in the correct period, project, budget line and reporting dimension.
• Prepare monthly, quarterly and annual program financial reports, including budget-versus-actual analysis, commitments, burn rate, forecasts, cash position and key exceptions requiring management action.
• Support preparation of Mastercard Foundation financial reports, fund requests, forecasts and supporting schedules for review by the Finance & Grants Manager.
• Track and proactively manage donor financial reporting deadlines through the ERP System (OCS), coordinating with program teams, country offices, and implementing partners to ensure the timely submission of accurate, complete, and compliant financial reports, while promptly addressing any reporting risks or delays.
• Maintain complete, orderly and accessible electronic records and audit trails for financial transactions, approvals, reallocations and key financial decisions.

• Support preparation, consolidation and periodic revision of program budgets and forecasts across assigned countries, workstreams, partners and implementation periods.
• Translate approved workplans and procurement plans into detailed budgets, cash-flow forecasts and expenditure projections.
• Monitor actual expenditure and commitments against approved budgets and implementation plans; investigate variances with budget holders and track agreed corrective actions.
• Support budget reallocations and donor approval requests by preparing analyses, reconciliations and supporting documentation.
• Monitor cost recovery, co-financing obligations, pooled and direct charges, and ensure approved allocation bases and supporting documentation are consistently applied.
• Provide practical financial guidance and training to program staff on budget interpretation, eligible costs, supporting documentation and use of financial reports or dashboards.

• Support financial due diligence and risk assessments of implementing partners before contracting and periodically during implementation.
• Review partner budgets, cash requests, financial reports, supporting documents and liquidations for completeness, accuracy and compliance before recommending payment or acceptance.
• Maintain up-to-date schedules of partner agreements, disbursements, expenditure, advances, outstanding balances, reporting status and close-out actions.
• Follow up overdue or incomplete partner reports and unsupported expenditure, escalating significant delays, exceptions or recovery issues.
• Support risk-based partner monitoring, spot checks and financial capacity strengthening, and document agreed improvement actions.

• Prepare cash-flow projections for assigned program components and support timely donor funding requests and partner disbursement planning.
• Raise donor invoices or requests, record receipts and follow up outstanding reimbursements and transfer advice.
• Process partner and supplier payments in a timely manner, ensuring all transactions are supported by approved budgets, valid agreements, complete supporting documentation, and comply with donor requirements, ILRI policies, and applicable statutory regulations.
• Perform monthly reconciliations of receivables, payables, advances, partner balances and relevant control accounts; follow up and clear reconciling items promptly.
• Monitor foreign currency transactions and program foreign exchange gains or losses and provide timely and accurate information to the Finance & Grants Manager and ILRI Treasury.

• Perform finance compliance checks over expenditure, travel, consultants, procurement-related transactions, assets, advances and partner payments in accordance with delegated responsibilities.
• Identify financial and compliance risks, maintain assigned risk and issue logs, and monitor implementation of agreed mitigation actions.
• Prepare audit schedules and supporting documentation and respond promptly to donor, internal and external audit or expenditure-verification requests.
• Track audit findings and management actions relevant to assigned program component and support timely closure.
• Promote segregation of duties, fraud awareness and prompt escalation of suspected irregularities or material control weaknesses

• Support accurate setup and maintenance of program structures, budgets, reporting dimensions and partner records in Agresso/Unit4 and other approved systems.
• Complete monthly and year-end reviews, reconciliations, accruals, corrections and project close processes within the agreed timetable.
• Prepare reliable dashboards and standardized schedules that provide program management with clear financial information and action points.
• Identify opportunities to simplify, standardize and automate finance workflows, while preserving appropriate controls and audit evidence.
• Support grant close-out, including final partner liquidation, resolution of commitments and balances, asset records, final reporting, audit support, refunds and records retention.

• Serve as the day-to-day finance focal point for assigned REAP program teams and partners, providing responsive, practical and solutions-oriented support.
• Work collaboratively with the Finance & Grants Manager, country finance teams, program leadership, Grants and Contracts, Procurement, Legal, People and Culture, Internal Audit and other service units.
• Prepare concise financial updates for program review meetings and follow up agreed finance actions to closure.
• Crosstrain an alternate staff member and provide support across the REAP finance team during peak reporting, budgeting, audit and close-out periods.
• Perform any other related duties as may be required.

• Bachelor’s degree in finance or accounting
• Full professional accounting qualification (CPA (K) or ACCA) and active membership in ICPAK or an equivalent recognized professional accounting body.
• At least Five years of relevant experience in accounting, preferably in program or project financial management. Experience managing the financial aspects of a Mastercard Foundation-funded project will be an added advantage.
• Experience using enterprise resource planning and financial reporting systems, with advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel. Experience with dashboards or business-intelligence tools is desirable
• Pro-active and Service minded; to provide efficient quality service to the program
• Integrity: Honest, above reproach and appropriate in actions / behaviour and transparent in conduct.
• Result Oriented/ Focused: Ability to consistently meet set goals. Focused, efficient and goal oriented. Ability to direct others to perform set duties.
• Professionalism: Application of ethics, principles, standards and expertise in all areas of work.
• Teamwork, Interpersonal Relations: Working and relating with others in mutual support and respect towards common goals and shared vision. Build and nurtures strong and authentic reciprocal relationships. Non-domineering or patronizing attitude and /or behaviour.
• Multi-cultural fit & Respect for Diversity: An ability to work effectively, respectfully and inclusively with people from different backgrounds and with different perspectives is critical for all staff members.
• Communication: Ability to express oneself, share and exchange information clearly and proactively, in a timely and client friendly style.
• Innovation & Creativity: Ability to generate new ideas and ways of working to continuously improve existing work processes, practices, concepts

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

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

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This position is at job level HG13 and it is only open to Kenyan nationals. The position is a 3-year contract, renewable subject to satisfactory performance and availability of funding. ILRI offers a competitive salary and benefits package which includes pension, medical and other insurances.