Skip to content
CV Rocket
Get started
How it worksThe enginePricingBlogContactSign in

Open nowPosted 12 hours agoWe saw it 53 min after it went up

Banana Breeding Lead (Re-advertisement)

Workable (global search)107,765 open roles

Where
Uganda, Central
Get the CV for this job

From $25 per CV, paid once. No subscription.

Your applicationOpen nowBanana Breeding Lead (Re-advertisement)Workable (global search) · Uganda, Central

  1. YouYes, apply to this one.

  2. CV RocketCV written for this posting.

  3. 25 readersRecruiter, hiring manager, skeptic. Round after round.

  4. CV RocketApplied on Workable (global search)'s own form.

The reply lands in your private mailbox

3×more interviews than doing it yourself with ChatGPT.

The clock on this job

Early applications get read.

7.9% of postings close within 7 days. Measured by our own scanner across the market. Workable (global search) postings stay open a median of 2 days.

Share of postings closed within
  1. 1.6%1 day
  2. 3.6%3 days
  3. 7.9%7 days
  4. 14.9%14 days
  5. 34.2%30 days
This job: posted 12 hours ago

Workable (global search) median: 2 days open

The posting

The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) invites applications for the internationally recruited position of Banana Breeding Lead.

The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) is a not-for-profit institution that generates agricultural innovations to meet Africa’s most pressing challenges of hunger, malnutrition, poverty, and natural resource degradation. Working with various partners across sub-Saharan Africa, we improve livelihoods, enhance food and nutrition security, increase employment, and preserve natural resource integrity. IITA is a member of CGIAR, a global agriculture research partnership for a food-secure future. Please visit http://www.iita.org/ for more information on IITA.

The Banana Breeding Lead will provide strategic leadership, coordination, and oversight of banana breeding activities primarily in East and West Africa, with additional responsibilities in Central and Southern Africa, ensuring full alignment with IITA’s strategy and operational plans. Additionally, the role involves setting breeding priorities in collaboration with key stakeholders; strengthening and improving breeding populations; advancing candidate varieties through multi-stage testing; supporting variety release and breeder seed production; and contributing to regional breeding networks, modernization initiatives, and resource mobilization efforts.

Overall, the incumbent will lead a team responsible for developing and delivering highly productive, climate-resilient, and nutritionally enhanced banana varieties that align with farmer needs and market preferences.

Position Responsibilities

  • Leadership: Lead and coordinate interdisciplinary research initiatives to advance and drive impact in banana and plantain crop improvement across IITA’s focus countries.
  • Product Design and Development: Implement an effective breeding strategy to develop elite breeding material and a product advancement process to identify new candidate varieties for targeted market segments and product profiles.
  • Modernization: Lead the modernization of banana and plantain crop improvement at IITA, with support from the Breeding Innovation Services (EiB) team and the Bayer Crop Science team.
  • Alignment: Ensure that the banana strategy is fully aligned with the Breeding for Tomorrow (B4T) framework, reflecting its priorities, objectives, and long-term vision.
  • Quality of Research: Foster high-quality breeding research by strengthening and integrating molecular and metabolomic tools, as well as bioassays, to accelerate selection efficiency.
  • Germplasm Development: Working with NARS and selected partners, obtain, identify and develop appropriate germplasm to sustain the breeding program. Also, support and initiate germplasm distribution to collaborating partners for varietal evaluation.
  • Coordination: Coordinate the development of stage gate multilocation product performance testing strategy, data analysis and advancement process, which is aligned with target market segments, TPEs or Agro-ecologies.
  • Optimization of Breeding Processes and Operations: Ensure cost effective breeding operations, and standard operating procedures that deliver agreed quality and performance indicators
  • Infrastructural Development: Contribute to infrastructural development of: (i) the plantain breeding program at the IITA, Ibadan (ii) the Mchare Breeding program at the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and technology, Arusha, Tanzania and (iii) the Matoke Breeding Program in Sendusu, Uganda.
  • Integration: Foster the integration of the IITA highland breeding program in Sendusu-Namulonge with the banana breeding program of NARO, Kawanda, Uganda
  • Collaboration and Partnerships:
  • Develop strong partnerships with national public breeding programs to collaboratively identify critical germplasm, product needs and define complementary breeding objectives.
  • Work in partnership with scientists from other disciplines and interact with industry partners and end users (farmers, extension agents, traders, consumers, etc.) from different organizations to design well defined and clearly prioritized Target Product Profiles in the Target Population of Environments.
  • Enable and actively support the regional crop network to collaboratively plan and implement breeding activities that optimize the development of individual and shared network germplasm products and builds capacity to share knowledge, best practices, training etc.
  • Enterprise Breeding Systems (EBS) and Breeding Analytics: Use Musa base for management of pedigree, nurseries, yield and disease trials, experimental data and seed inventory along with Bioflow to analyze the raw data
  • Capacity Building: Provide training and mentorship to breeding staff, partners and scholars on breeding techniques, methodologies, data analysis and scientific communication.
  • Resource Mobilisation: Lead and or contribute to the development of research proposals and other fundraising activities.
  • Publication: Lead or contribute to publication of research results in international, peer reviewed journals (Thompson-indexed journals with impact factor)
  • Reporting: Develop and deliver high-quality monthly and annual reports that track progress, analyze outcomes, and document achievements against set targets
  • Any other duties assigned by the supervisor

Requirements

Educational Qualifications

The candidate should have a Ph.D. in Plant Breeding, Genetics or any other related field.

Core Competencies

  • At least 10 years of experience in plant breeding programs
  • Evidence of significant management skills including change management and management of successful breeding teams
  • Ability to work well in a diverse multicultural environment
  • Excellent interpersonal and organizational skills
  • Proven track record in resource mobilization.
  • Excellent written and oral communication skills
  • Ability to build consensus/function as part of a team
  • Problem solving and decision-making skills
  • Resilience under pressure along with sound risk judgment
  • Experience of managing staff and budgets

Benefits

Duty Station: Sendusu, Uganda

General information: The contract will be for an initial period of three years. IITA offers an internationally competitive remuneration package paid in US Dollars.

Applications: Applications must include a cover letter which should address how the candidate’s background/experience relates to the specific duties of the position applied for, curriculum vitae, and names and addresses of three professional referees (which must include either the Head of the applicant’s current or previous organization or applicant’s direct Supervisor/Superior at his/her present or former place of work). The application should be addressed to the Director of People and Culture. Please complete our online application form using this link: https://apply.workable.com/iita/#jobs

Closing Date: 26 October 2026

IITA is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to building a diverse workforce, particularly welcoming applications from women.

While all applications will be acknowledged, please note that only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.

From $25, paid onceGet the CV for this job

What happens when you press

One press. We do the rest.

  1. A CV for this posting

    Written against Workable (global search)'s own wording, from every piece of relevant proof in your profile.

  2. 25 readers review it

    Recruiter, hiring manager, skeptic and more read every draft, round after round. You get the best round.

    The review screen in CV Rocket: how each CV was read, round by round.

  3. We apply on Workable (global search)'s form

    Our application engine gets through the hardest forms there are. Where a question needs you, AI suggests the best answer. Don't want us applying from our IP addresses? Use our Chrome extension: we apply straight from your own browser.

    An application in CV Rocket: every answer filled in on the employer's form.

  4. Every reply, sorted

    Workable (global search)'s answer lands in your private mailbox, and we classify it on arrival: interview, question, rejection.

    The CV Rocket inbox: each employer reply classified as an interview, an action or a rejection.

  5. Reply with AI

    AI helps you write the email, checks it and sends it. We show you whether the recruiter read it.

  6. The interview in your calendar

    Full integration with your calendar. The invitation goes straight in.

    An interview invitation in the CV Rocket inbox, added to the candidate's calendar.
Get the CV for this job

From $25 per CV, paid once. No subscription.

Why it works

3×

more interviews than doing it yourself with ChatGPT.

ChatGPT writes a CV and never learns what happened to it. We see every reply. For each CV we know:

  • How it was written, and how the review scored it
  • When we applied, and how long after the posting went up
  • Which posting, which company, which city
  • Who got the interview, and who heard nothing

That is how we know which CVs get called.

Get the CV for this job

From $25 per CV, paid once. No subscription.

The numbers game

More applications. More interviews.

Every application goes out with its own CV, written for that posting and paid once. Send enough of them and the law of large numbers finds you the job.

Get the CV for this job
By hand5–10
With CV Rocket100
applications a day

Nearby

Live postings like this one

Same employer first, then the same role elsewhere.

Before you press

Straight answers

Get the CV for this job

From $25 per CV, paid once. No subscription.

What if my background isn't good enough?

We make the most of the background you have. The CV uses every piece of relevant proof your profile holds, and one of the 25 readers reads your whole profile and flags what the CV left out.

Do you really apply for me?

Yes, on the employer's own form, the hardest ones included. Where a question needs you, you answer it right there and AI suggests the best answer. Don't want us applying from our IP addresses? Use our Chrome extension: we apply straight from your own browser.

Is it a subscription?

No. You pay once per CV, from $25. Every application goes out with its own CV, written for that posting.

One job. One CV.
Paid once.

Pick the posting you want. We write for it, apply for you and catch the reply.

Get the CV for this job

From $25 per CV, paid once. No subscription.