Careers and vacancies

We are looking for a Controller to work closely with cocoa origins and trade offices to improve profitability by ensuring sound business controls and good operational practices are in place.

The role will be supporting the Divisional Operation & Business Controller as part of a small Operations team.  The role involves extensive interaction with other parts of the Group in  accounting, treasury, internal audit and risk management.  The role will include some travel.

Main Responsibilities

Supporting the Divisional Operation & Business Controller, the role will:

• Work with overseas subsidiaries and trade offices to ensure a high level of operational, reporting  and financial control exists
• Manage the monthly management reporting process for the Cocoa Division , to provide insightful analysis of company and division results, risks and KPIs
• Assist subsidiaries with cash management
• Undertake risk management for given subsidiaries
• Support production of budgets, business plans and capital expenditure for the division
• Work closely with subsidiaries to optimise systems and help execute a planned major systems change.

Skills & Experience

• Qualified Accountant or equivalent experience in a Controller role.
• University degree in Finance, Accounting, Business or equivalent.

• 2-3 years of experience in commodities industry within a related or similar role.
• Excellent Excel skills
• French or Spanish is a plus.

Personal skills

• Self-starter who is able to juggle priorities
• Hands on and practical
• Diplomatic, resourceful, culturally aware

This position will play a key role in providing a range of finance support activities for Ecom Ghana Cocoa division. This will include reviewing and reconciliation of key financial reports to ensure accurate and timely reporting to Ghana management and group.  As well as supporting budgeting processes, and involvement in the execution of the forecast cycle used to monitor and project business performance. The role is also a contributor for driving harmonization and improvement in management reporting, planning, and analysis processes for area of assignment.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

• Supervise accounts staff and oversee their work.
• Ensure correctness, completeness and accuracy of data
• Review of Asset Register and other Accruals
• Timely completion of COGNOS
• Managing the accurate and timely delivery of financial reporting data
• Prepare monthly/quarterly/annual financial reports.
• Reconciling of all General ledger (PNL and BS)
• Prepare various schedules and report
• Review various daily and weekly reconciliation and report for submission to FD & AFC
• Establishing and fostering partnerships with management across the organization
• Follow up on key issues of intercompany, stock, AR & AP reconciliation.
• Coordinating with finance team to assist with statutory auditors  
• Develop/design various SAP reports to meet stakeholder's request
• Team development and arranging various workshop to increase the competencies
• Review SOP and Conduct walkthrough of ICS documents

EDUCATION, PRIOR WORK EXPERIENCE, AND SPECIALIZED SKILLS/KNOWLEDGE: 

• Education Background (Minimum): Bachelor’s degree in Accounting or finance
• Other Qualifications: ICA/ACCA /MBA is a plus
• Special Skills:
  • Accounting Software (SAP)
  • MS Office (Excel is essential)
• Years of Experience: Minimum of 5 years with 3 years’ managerial position.
• Ability to support and interact with business unit leadership and corporate departments; successfully manage teams/clients through change
• Problem-solving and analytical ability.
• Manages time effectively and adapts to changing priorities.
• Accuracy and attention to details.
• Team player who works productively with a wide range of people.
• Capable of working with minimum supervision.
• Excellent communication skills with employees at all levels.
• Supervisory experience with strong management skills. 
• Demonstrate flexibility while delivering clear results in a fast-paced environments
• Should be able to work for extra hours

SMS - Our Global Cocoa Sustainability Team based in London focus on the direction, management and collation of Cocoa sustainability projects, processes and information.   The Team works closely with our Origin SMS Teams who manage the on the ground projects and collection of data/information. 

In the Ivory Coast, the Team has begun to adapt to a new model where we work with our local partners to implement sustainability programs for our clients. This allows us the ability to grow faster in a challenging environment and also opens the opportunity to create space for cross learning between our partners and our own staff at Zamacom.

Key Responsibilities:

-    Liaise with the sustainability teams of our partner exporter organizations in Ivory Coast in the development of client proposals and understanding of their implementation processes, budgeting and reporting

-    Monitor and verify program implementation through visits to the field with our partners' program implementation staff

-    Support in client reporting in order to meet external deadlines and ensure the flow of required verified data in a timely manner

-    Support sustainability teams of both our partners and Zamacom in the development of carbon reduction and removal projects to meet objectives established in ECOM's Net Zero roadmap for cocoa as well as the implementation of action plans to be developed under CFI 2.0.

-    Once established, support required monitoring and reporting on these projects in collaboration with ECOM's carbon team

-    Lead Smarter Cocoa reporting on behalf of our partners in collaboration with the Global Cocoa Sustainability Team.

Skills & Experience

The successful candidate should have a minimum of 2 years relevant commercial experience within a similar role in a commodity/sustainability environment and a relevant degree or equivalent experience in an agriculture, business, sustainability. 

A focussed approach to sustainability within origin and its link to the business is important and ability to work with different stakeholders.  Strong project management skills and fluent English and French is essential.

ECOM West Africa (WECOM) works in a selection of communities that produce and trade major international commodities. WECOM contributes to the prosperity of its host communities by providing products and services that enable farmers to increase household incomes, build income resilience, improve, and sustain community access to social services. WECOM works with over 150,000 smallholder farmers in West Africa through its Sustainable Management Services (SMS) division.

Background - SMS, West Africa

SMS executes high-quality sustainability programs to raise farmers’ productivity and prosperity through tailored training and supply of specific products and services (including agro-inputs and financial services). Further, SMS delivers or catalyzes the delivery of social products and services that support the prosperity of host communities. SMS contributes to WECOM’s goals and objectives by using data and market insights to inform the development and delivery of products and services to farmers/farmer communities and to catalyze the continuous improvement of WECOM’s performance.

Background- SMS, West Africa, Data Insights

As part of ECOM’s data system’s strengthening efforts, digitizing data collected through standard data collection tools and centrally storing it in an accessible database that can be used in automated reports is a key milestone.  The Data Team is looking for a skilled Data Analyst who has a passion for data, automation and analytics and can extract, transform and load data from multiple sources (ETL) and dig deep into the details. An in-depth understanding of ETL, data modeling techniques, and the ability to perform in a team is critical to success in this role.

Scope of work

The Data Analyst will assist the Data Team with its data analytics efforts and work with various country teams to a) clarify existing business problems, establish available data, and identify analytics and modeling techniques and apply them to answer key business questions; b) automate routine data handling processes, conduct ETL and high-quality data analytics by applying data analysis techniques and tools, data mining, optimization tools, statistical modeling, and machine learning techniques; and c) train other Data Team members in Python and other data management tools and techniques.

Qualifications and requirements

The Data Analyst must meet the following qualifications.

• Bachelors in computer science, economics, data science, statistics, or quantitative field are required.
• At least two (2) years of experience in applied Python data analysis and automation, SQL, and ETL is required.
• Proven experience with other process automation, data processing, or programming languages advantageous
• Proven experience with Python data management libraries (Pandas, Matplotlib/Seaborn, Numpy, among others)
• Experience in managing geographical information data and software advantageous.
• Experience with data visualization tools, such as Power BI, is advantageous.
• High communication skills in English, both written and spoken.
• High level of Microsoft Excel
• Excellent teamwork and communication skills
• Excellent time management skills

• Previous experience in the cocoa industry advantageous

ECOM is searching for a highly motivated intern to join the climate change team to be a key support in data collection, analysis and research that will support ECOM to achieve its SBTi commitments. The climate change intern will work closely with the global carbon manager and the climate project manager to establish a set of datasets necessary for different carbon accounting purposes and will gain relevant knowledge and experience in carbon accounting and climate mitigation corporate strategy.

Main responsibilities:

• Provide support with data analysis and collection on carbon emissions and removals from our global supply chain to update our corporate baselines.
• Perform a country level database of interventions, tracking of carbon emissions, removals and gap to reach reduction targets by 2030.
• Perform literature research on removals performance such as biochar, agroforestry, and soil carbon accumulation.
• Develop training content for climate change managers on the GHG protocol standards and considerations.
• Perform literature research on climate adaptation in coffee, cocoa and cotton supply chains.
• Support on carbon credits estimations with literature research.
• Provide support to country origins and clients on carbon data per traded product.

Qualifications:

• Master in science/ engineering in environmental management/ agriculture/climate change/ natural resources management/ environmental sciences or any other relevant superior education
• At least 1 year of working experience
• Good understanding of life cycle assessments, carbon footprint assessments and climate change science
• Excellent research skills
• Excellent Excel, Microsoft word, QGIS and PowerPoint skills. Modelling skills are preferred.
• Excellent English skills
• Effective communication and negotiation skills.
• Proactive, self-starter, organized, works well under pressure.

Job employment type & Condition

• This position will report to the Global Carbon Manager in close collaboration with the commodity sustainability managers at the origins.
• Based preferably in Switzerland or EU. Remote work is open for discussion.
• The climate intern will work under the Climate Change department, a highly motivated and cooperative team under a friendly and supportive working environment.
• 1 year position (open for discussion)

Our Cocoa Bean Trade Desk is based in our London office which is supported by a Shipping Team that provide vital support to the Trade Desk by delivering our trade/contracts to our customers and suppliers.

The Role
We are looking for a Shipping Coordinator to focus on our Ivory Coast operation.  Working with the Trade team the individual will be responsible for the physical shipments of cocoa beans to our customers.   Duties will include:

• Working with the Shipping Manager to provide logistic support to the Ivory Coast trading team
• Liaising with our overseas operations, suppliers, shipping lines, freight forwarders and warehouse partners
• Monitoring of shipments, agreements and all related documentation.
• Checking & processing invoices for payment and liaising with the Accounts team.
• Processing bank presentations & LC’s
• Organising timely deliveries to clients
• Stock management

Skills & Experience

• At least 3 years proven experience in shipping/logistics within a similar environment.
• Bilingual – French/English – the majority of external communication (written and spoken is in French and therefore fluent French is required).
• Commodities related experience preferred
• Highly organised with the ability to track and manage variety of shipments within a busy period.
• Excellent Excel and system skills
• Excellent communications skills

The role will involve some training period/trip to Ivory Coast and annual visits to see local team

Server & Network Administrator - Level 2-3

He/She is responsible for providing infrastructure technical support for all assets hosted in the EMEA zone.  This position has frequent contact with internal clients, peers, managers, and independent vendors and will require a bit of flexibility to participate to meetings, incident solving, maintenance and on-duty, outside of local business hours and weekends as well as occasional travel.

The Server & Network administrator is responsible to manage systems supporting ECOM employees, to contribute to design, setup, maintain and  troubleshoot the core infrastructure, monitor key systems and occasionally provide desktop support to local users.

KEY DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

Technology: Citrix, VMWare, Storage,  HyperV, Windows Server, Active Directory,  VEEAM Backup, MS365, Manage engine suite tools, Cisco, Aruba, Meraki, Sonicwall

• Install, configure during project phases  and troubleshoot and work with the ticketing system to ensure tickets are resolved within Service Level Agreement set times.
• Plan, Configure and optimize hardware, operating systems, network, storage, and backup devices for reliability, availability and performance
• Diagnose, resolve and work with vendors as required.
• Creation and analysis of metrics related to the health and performance the environments
• Diagnosis and root cause analysis of IT incidents and reporting to the management
• Work with peer infrastructure teams, application teams, service providers, and end-users to ensure solid solutions to maintain secure, and highly available systems
• Documents and updates Standard Operation Procedures, inventories, follow strictly the governance.

QUALIFICATION AND EXPERIENCE:

• Holder of a Swiss CFC (IT, Electronic) or higher education, certifications an asset
• 5-10  years of strong experience in  server and network administration
• Strong knowledge of Windows Server, VMWare, Citrix and Cisco networking (including BGP, EIGRP, OSPF and MPLS)
• Fluent in French and very good technical communication skills in English
• Certifications an advantage
• Swiss/ European citizen or holder of a valid work visa in Switzerland

PROFILE AND SKILLS:

• Excellent customer service attitude and problem solving abilities and experience
• Willingness to constantly maintain qualifications by analyzing technical issues
• Strong organization skills and attention to detail and accuracy
• Strong analytical skills for problem solving, technically curious
• Sense of responsibility and ability to work independently
• Comfortable to work in a multicultural and international environment
• Flexible and ability to work in a fast paced environment

MISCELLANOUS:

• Permanent role
• Location: Pully – Switzerland
• Starting date: asap
• No remote work

We are currently looking for a .Net/SQL Developer and Analyst to work with our Cotton group in the Dallas office. This position will be responsible for the technical design, implementation, testing and production support activities.

Essential Functions

● Build functional and technical specifications based on user requirements

● Build datasets for data visualization tools based on user requirements

● Develop using object-oriented programming in Visual Studio .Net with C# (ASP.NET

● Understanding of complex problems, interpret business and system requirements, work flows, use cases, functional/technical design and implementation

● Integrate new technology into new and existing systems to include the transition and migration of applications

● Provide technical guidance and instruction to users and IT specialists

● Create user manuals and other documentation

Competencies

● Excellent verbal and written communication and interpersonal skills

● Strong ability to communicate technical concepts to non-technical users

● Work collaboratively in a team environment, as part of an international project team

● Work independently and taking lead on analysis

● Results oriented with exceptional organizational skills

Required Education and Experience

● 3+ years of experience with data analysis and data visualization tools such as Power BI, Tableau, etc.

● 5+ years of experience in .NET programming in Visual Studio, .NET 2017/2019 with C# (ASP.NET)

● 5+ years of experience in performing and tuning queries and implementation of tables, views, stored procedures, functions and triggers using SQL Server 2016 and above

● Structure/object oriented analysis using UML

● Knowledge in reporting in Crystal Reports

Preferred Education and Experience

● Bachelors degree in a related field

● Experience with cotton or any other commodity business and familiarity with the transactinoal flow of commodities is a plus

● Spanish fluency is a plus

This person will be in charge of the development and execution of carbon credit projects and supporting our sustainability managers at origin. This role requires end-to-end structuring of carbon projects under the most recognizable voluntary certification standards.

Responsibilities:

• Participate in all stages of structuring projects (feasibility assessments, carbon modeling, contract negotiation, listing of carbon project to exchanges, MRV);
• Support in the carbon accounting of different removal projects across different origins to achieve the Net-Zero strategy of the company;
• Advising internal stakeholders in the development of own carbon credits projects, methodologies, types and provide general structuring advice and optimization of returns throughout the carbon project development process;
• Conduct financial feasibility assessment and evaluation of international investment opportunities in global voluntary carbon markets;
• Support the drafting of commercial proposals and contracts;
• Structure and develop international carbon offset projects
• Evaluating and recommending the most appropriate/competitive funding options for the projects, including agreements with ECOM’s clients
• Negotiations of project documentation such as partnership agreements, joint ventures, long term offtake prepayment and others;
• Preparation of investor presentation and material to road show investment opportunities;
• Conduct day-to-day interactions with business units in different jurisdictions, for carbon offset portfolio development and project finance.

Qualifications:

•  2-5 years experience in carbon markets with strong knowledge of nature-based solutions, quantification of carbon removals, certification process of carbon credits
• Degree in Environmental sciences, Environmental engineering, sustainability management, business administration
• Hands-on experience of carbon accounting, project finance , investment structuring and evaluation
•  Excellent verbal and written communication skills in English
•  Practical knowledge about carbon credit voluntary standards
•  Solid understanding about carbon project cycle and carbon market dynamics;
•  Languages: fluency in english, spanish is good to have;
• Hands-on experience of project management and/or consulting in international investment projects in sectors relevant to climate mitigation and adaptation.
• Strong analytical, problem-solving and decision-making skills.
• Effective communication and negotiation skills.
• Proactive, self-starter, organized, works well under pressure.
•  Understanding of the practical aspects of accounting and tax matters and cross border transaction structuring
• Works collaboratively with stakeholders across all levels, all cultures, and all geographies;
• Ability to work independently and with minimal guidance.

Job employment type & Condition

This position will report to the Head of Climate Change Strategy with close collaboration with the commodity sustainability managers at the origins.

This is a full time position, to be based preferably in Switzerland or the UK. Remote work is open for discussion.

The carbon credits project developer will work under  the Climate Change department, a highly motivated and cooperative team under a friendly and supportive working environment.

Job Summary

The Legal Assistant will provide support to the London based Legal Team (4 full time lawyers) in all areas of legal administration and support, as well as maintaining a company secretarial database (Diligent).  The role will also involve liaising with other legal and company secretarial members within the Global ECOM Group and other stakeholders.will provide support the London based Legal Team (3 lawyers and a Compliance Analyst) in all areas of administration and support.  The role will also involve liaising with other legal and company secretarial members within the ECOM Group and external lawyers.

Responsibilities

The role will provide proactive admin support to the team and will include but not be restricted to the following:

• Assistance in preparing conditions precedent for financings, compiling and filing transaction bibles.
• Running an annual audit of the Group’s company structure database.
• Verifying data from the audit against the central database.
• Liaising with local management to monitor their maintenance of company secretarial records.
• Updating and maintaining Diligent as needed.
• Assisting with security profiles for Diligent and onboarding and offboarding users.
• Arranging training needs for the Group’s company structure database as necessary.
• Managing signing mandates and powers of attorney, their renewal and databases.
• Day-to-day management of signing, recording and filing of documentation, including NDA database maintenance.
• Maintaining group LEI records.
• Assisting with CFTC filings and other ad hoc reporting.
• Occasional trademark administrative matters. 
• Arranging notarisation and legalisation of documentation for overseas purposes.
• Running bi-annual review of key contracts and significant litigations and reporting.
• Assistance with KYC queries when required and running background checks – cover for the part-time compliance administrator.
• Maintaining external legal counsel database.
• Recording and processing local legal spend and challenging global legal spend.
• Assisting with audit enquiries.

Skills & Experience:

• Previous legal secretarial experience within a corporate environment
• Interest in working within an in-house Legal Team
• Team player with good communication skills (both written and oral)
• Excellent MS Office and related System skills
• Ability to multi-task
• Detail conscious and tenacious.

Spanish, Portuguese and/or French language speakers would be an advantage but not essential