AWOLA (Africa Women Leaders in Agro-ecology) is a leadership career development initiative of the PELUM network, with the aim of equipping women working on agroecology, sustainable agriculture and food systems with leadership skills.
Why Should I Apply?
AWOLA aims to put women at the heart of transforming African agriculture. The 3 year leadership program aims to create high level women leadership in agroecology, sustainable agriculture and food systems transformation, who will influence and negotiate for the space of agroecology in policies and programs across African countries.
What Awola Offers
✓ Mentorship: The actual mentorship will entail a process where mentee and mentors who are at different scales and career levels develop supportive relationships around their professional and personal capacities. The process will entail a matchmaking session based on the gaps and skills across mentees and mentors.
✓ Training: AWOLA will support mentees in a 1 year program (through virtual and face to face sessions), who will be trained to become leaders and effective negotiators, in influencing policies and programming while building collaborations with different stakeholders for desired outcomes. Through AWOLA mentees and mentors will be supported to participate in structured learning to build up on the agroecology and leadership knowledge base.
✓ Development of leadership innovation ideas: The mentees and mentors will be supported to develop networks and work on innovation ideas. The innovation ideas will be shared with PELUM networks for integration across programs, where possible the coalition members will be encouraged to fundraise and further supported through the PELUM network to implement their ideas with the aim of supporting transformation of agriculture and food systems.
Selection Process
(1) The AWOLA mentees and mentors will be identified through a competitive selection process that will include assessing their experience and leadership potential in agroecology, agriculture, and food systems development.
(2) Potential mentees and mentors will respond to an open call for application that will require them to demonstrate their suitability (application here)
(3) A selection panel of experts in agroecology, agriculture, food systems and leadership will review the applications. The final selection will be carried out by the AWOLA advisory panel.
Timeline for this year’s application review process:
July 25th – Application Open
August 20th – Deadline for Application Submissions
August 31st – Final Round Top Candidates Notified for Interviews
