Senior Land Adviser

Senior Land Adviser
Salary: Manager Level 3: £31,000 - £34,000
Contract type: Permanent
Working hours: Full time
Location: Somerset Wildlife Trust, County of Somerset with opportunities for hybrid working.

Our client is a local independent charity and the only organisation uniquely focused on improving the natural environment of Somerset for the benefit of wildlife and people. They are looking for an experienced land management adviser to oversee the provision of land management advice and support which will deliver their goals for 2030 across Somerset through:

• Proactively developing relationships and projects with a range of landowners and communities that enables land management which stimulates nature’s recovery, maximises nature-based solutions provision, develops new avenues of sustainable farming systems, and secures a long-term economic future for land managers and farmers committing to nature recovery.

• Working closely alongside their nature recovery and sales consultancy teams identifying opportunities to fund the delivery of land management advice through emerging funding mechanisms such as Environmental Land Management Scheme, Biodiversity Net Gain and carbon sequestration, alongside identifying, enabling and delivering commercial opportunities.

• Growing the skills base within the charity and work closely with their commercial arm and the Somerset Environmental Records Centre to ensure that they can provide a range of basic, standard and bespoke land management advisory service across the charity.

Key Responsibilities and Tasks:

Leadership & Management:

The Senior Land Adviser will support the Nature Recovery Team by supervising and line managing the Mendip Hills Farm Facilitation Co-Ordinator and Mendip Landscape Recovery Officer by:

• Ensuring they deliver smooth coordination of the day-to-day running of the programmes.
• Managing the project budget and submission of quarterly grant claims.
• Preparing and writing reports.
• Overseeing the monitoring of the Rural Payments Supervise Agency.

Responsibility 1: Conservation Management

Share knowledge and expertise by:

• Providing conservation management advice and building strong relationships with a range of landowners and farm advisers, by understanding farming and forestry and integrating the charity's nature recovery advice within those systems.
• Providing expertise on the restoration of land and creation of habitats to support the Local Nature Recovery Network, Agri-environment scheme outcomes and nature-based solutions.

Responsibility 2: Building Relationships with the Land Owning/ Management Community.

Be proactive and nurture strong relationships by:

• Leading on the development of new farm cluster pilots and other group relationships that will inspire and enable land managers to engage in habitat management, restoration and creation.  Including delivery of wetland nature recovery networks and floodplain reconnection.
• Building a whole farm approach in the protection and expansion of Local Wildlife Sites.
• In co-ordination with their Sales team identifying and where agreed undertaking and facilitating targeted habitat and species surveying as part of project development and providing detailed management advisory reports and project programmes enabling nature recovery.
• Bringing in specialist farming knowledge to the charity.
• Supporting the transition of Somerset farming enterprises where the delivery of natural capital is considered alongside traditional food and fiber production.

Responsibility 3: Growing their Land Management Advisory Service

Provide leadership and grasp opportunities to grow their service by:

• Proactively seeking and developing projects and funding regimes that will support the continued funding and expansion of a their Land Management Advisory Service including (but not limited by): developing new Landscape Recovery Applications, undertaking Countryside Stewardship applications and management plans, developing services that support nature-based solutions (e.g. nutrient mitigations) etc.
• Planning and delivering as required tailored training programme of workshops and onsite-demonstrations that cover a variety of work areas including delivering nature-based solutions, nature friendly farming and agri-environmental scheme outcomes for landholders including work on SSSIs, priority habitats, as well as priority species and landscapes.

Additional benefits of working for them include:

• 7% employer pension contribution
• Life insurance
• An annual professional institution subscription
• Flexible and agile working
• Wellbeing support – EAP, wellbeing champions
• Diversity networks through RSWT/TWT
• Paid volunteer days
• Continuous Professional Development opportunities
• Minimum 33 days of holiday (25 annual leave + bank holidays)
• Active staff social events

Closing date: Monday 22 April 2024

Interested?

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The opportunity to make a real and positive difference to nature, communities and the climate.

No agencies please.