IUCN is the world’s oldest and largest global environmental network - a democratic membership union with more than 1,000 government and NGO member organizations, and almost 11,000 volunteer scientists in more than 160 countries. IUCN’s work is supported by more than 1,000 professional staff in 45 offices and hundreds of partners in public, NGO and private sectors around the world. Its headquarters are based in Gland, Switzerland.

IUCN’s work focuses on valuing and conserving nature, ensuring effective and equitable governance of its use, and deploying nature-based solutions to global challenges in climate, food and development. IUCN supports scientific research, manages field projects all over the world, and brings governments, NGOs, the UN and companies together to develop policy, laws and best practice.

Under direct supervision of the European Biodiversity Conservation Coordinator and in collaboration with other staff of the IUCN European Regional Office, the Biodiversity Conservation Assistant will support the work and projects of the IUCN Global Species Programme in Europe. This will include providing support to certain tasks within the project portfolio, as needed. The workload is expected to be 60% administrative support and 40% technical support, although this proportion could change depending on the real project needs during the time period of this contract. Administrative support includes assistance with project development, contract administration, and event planning and organisation. Specifically, the position will entail:

• Assist in the implementation of the European Red Lists Initiative, currently encompassing Hoverflies but could be expanded, including: liaising with experts and monitoring their progress in delivering high quality assessments, coordinating all administrative tasks inherent to the organization of assessment workshops, compiling species photos and uploading them to the Red List Species Information System, and contributing to drafting project reports. Providing support to this task will require some training in Red List assessments that will be provided by the team.
• Support the implementation of new projects in the portfolio related to pollinator conservation and invasive alien species management that entail the organization of stakeholder meetings and workshops;
• Support the organization of project meetings and events;
• Support the development of new project proposals;
• Provide a range of administrative support functions on a day-to-day basis transversal to several projects (e.g. processing of invoices, issuing consultancy contracts, etc);
• Will be required to provide support on a range of tasks as delegated by his/her Line Manager.