Are you passionate about contributing to change that matters and do you want to support advocacy work at Solidaridad? We offer you a challenging internship in an inspiring international setting with the opportunity to learn and make a difference in the world.
Advocacy Intern
(4/6 months, 32 hrs/week, based in Utrecht)
Description
Solidaridad is a global civil society organization working on fostering solutions for sustainable production practices across various supply chains. Our mission is to bring together supply chain players and engage them with innovative solutions to improve production, thus ensuring the transition to a sustainable and inclusive economy that maximizes benefit for all. Solidaridad is an international network organization consisting of eight Regional Expertise Centers (RECs) located around the world (Asia, Southern Africa, East and Central Africa, West Africa, South America, Central America, North America and Europe), each with their own specific expertise and focus.
This internship is geared towards building knowledge of the Policy Influencing team, particularly around topics related to sustainability in the textile sector.
Tasks
- Update internal Knowledge Hub aimed at sharing knowledge on cotton and textiles across the organization and contribute to knowledge sharing sessions internally
- Support Solidaridad’s work on purchasing practices, like contributing to the Learning and Implementation community of the Common Framework for Responsible Purchasing practices and the development of an add on tool
- Analyze the EU strategy for sustainable and textile textiles and identify key issues for Solidaridad’s work in Europe and in producing countries, and list possible upcoming priorities for the EU on sustainability and textiles
- Support our policy work on textiles and EU, including through cooperation with other stakeholders
- Undertake a scoping exercise in relation to the upcoming EU Regulation on Forced Labour
- Be part of the Policy Influencing team and contribute to projects ad hoc.
Learning objectives
- To learn about evidence-based advocacy and policy influencing work in a civil society organization;
- To learn about the cotton and textiles sectors;
- To learn about EU policy on sustainability;
- To learn about working in coalition with other civil society organization;
- To learn to work across functions (policy influencing, corporate engagement, communications, knowledge management and learning) in an organization;
Period: 4 to 6 months (min 24 – max 36 hours per week)
Start date: September/October 2023
Candidate’s profile
You are inspired by the job and responsibilities as described above, and you recognize yourself in the following:
- Following a Bachelor or Master’s degree in development studies, international relations, or business related at a Dutch University;
- Affinity with the vision and mission of Solidaridad;
- Skills in processing information and summarizing it in short papers;
- Excellent analytical and writing skills;
- Service-oriented, proactive and team player;
- Pragmatic, flexible and autonomous;
- Ability to connect and work with people from all backgrounds and cultures;
- Professional fluency in English;
- Able to meet deadlines;
- Allowed to work in the Netherlands.
Our offer
- Support in the development of your learning or research plan;
- Onboarding, support and coaching to enable you to learn;
- A unique and challenging internship within an inspiring and international setting;
- A 4 to 6-month contract, internship compensation (EUR 250/300), and reimbursement of travel costs;
- A working space in our inspiring office in Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Travel required: primarily Solidaridad office, incidental travel to external meetings in NL. No international travel.
In Solidaridad, diversity, equity and inclusion are key to our collective mission, vision and values; We enable farmers and workers to earn a living income, shape their own future, and produce in balance with nature by working throughout the whole supply chain to make sustainability the norm.
We aim for Solidaridad Europe to be an inclusive place where all people feel heard, seen, and valued for their diverse identities, experiences, perspectives and skills.
We are therefore committed to ensuring a safe and healthy working environment by treating everyone with dignity and respect, enabling and empowering us to be ourselves and achieve our full potential as individuals and our collective mission as an organization.
Next steps
Do you recognize yourself in the candidate profile? Then please send your one-page motivation letter and two-page resume in English to hr-europe@solidaridadnetwork.org, stating “Application: Advocacy Intern” in the subject header.
If you already have ideas about what you would like to learn or research during your internship at Solidaridad Europe, please indicate this in your motivation letter. Also indicate clearly when you are able to start.
Questions can be addressed to hr-europe@solidaridadnetwork.org. No agencies please.
Any personal data submitted in an application is treated confidentially and processed for the sole purpose of filling a vacancy, and compliant to the GDPR directive. After the selection process has been completed (upon date of filled vacancy), all personal data of applicants who have not been selected will be destroyed immediately, unless we have your explicit approval to store your personal data for a period of maximum a year.
Background
Solidaridad envisions a world in which all we produce and all we consume can sustain us, while respecting the planet, each other and the next generations. We bring together supply chain actors and engage them in innovative solutions to improve production, ensuring the transition to a sustainable and inclusive economy that maximizes the benefit for all.
Solidaridad is an international network organization consisting of eight regional expertise centers located around the world (Asia, South America, Southern Africa, East and Central Africa, West Africa, Central America, North America and Europe), each with their own specific expertise and focus. Globally, Solidaridad works across 13 commodities.
Solidaridad Europe focuses on market development, policy influencing, communications and donor relations. We seek to inspire the private sector, governments, civil society organizations and consumers in Europe to contribute to sustainable economic development.
For more information please refer to our website: http://www.solidaridadnetwork.org.
