Project Officer: Landscape Recovery & Sustainable Farming

As part of an expanding programme of work with the Farming sector, The River Thame Conservation Trust is seeking to recruit two posts. Both roles provide a fantastic career development opportunity, working at the vanguard of landscape scale nature recovery and new markets in ecosystem services. As part of a dynamic, delivery-focused organisation, the Trust will nurture the growth of your skills and capabilities, with a view to their long-term contribution to our success.

Project Officer: Landscape Recovery & Sustainable Farming
Location: Office base in Wheatley (Oxford), with fieldwork throughout the Thame Catchment
Working Days: Fulltime (37.5 hours per week)
Length of Contract: 3 years (with an aspiration to convert to open-ended, subject to organisational needs, and future funding).
Starting Salary: £30-34K p.a. depending on skills and experience
Place of Work: Hybrid working, office based at Wheatley, Oxfordshire with regular travel throughout the catchment and some home working.

We are seeking an enthusiastic and experienced Project Officer to play a key role in the coordination and delivery of the Ock and Thame Farmers Freshwater and Floodplains Restoration Project, which is one of the most exciting wetland recovery schemes in the UK, funded by the latest round of Defra’s Landscape Recovery Programme. This is a partnership project with Freshwater Habitats Trust and aims to halt and reverse the decline of freshwater biodiversity and use nature-based solutions to contribute to net zero. This initial two-year funded phase will seek to establish a basis for a long-term (20 year) phase, enabled by private and public funds which will be sought as part of the initial 2-year phase. Capitalising on extensive existing experience of freshwater and catchment management, the project will bring freshwater and wetland habitats into favourable condition, at least double the extent of priority and wildlife-rich freshwaters and increase freshwater and wetland carbon stocks.

You will play an important role in the 2-year Landscape Recovery development phase, liaising with farmers and other stakeholders; helping to commission and manage work streams to inform the project development; coordinate, collate and map baseline data for participating landholdings; help design practical land and habitat management interventions and prioritise opportunities to enhance sites in line with the project aims.

This is an exciting role with opportunities to work with a wide partnership base, across two catchments, with varied activities, covering both desk-based and field-based work. The role is strategically significant, seeking as it does to address policy imperatives of nature recovery and net zero and new funding mechanisms (opportunities from green finance, whilst capitalising on a new funding landscape available to farmers).