Job Description

SUMMARY



This is a key role for our projects in the agriculture domain. An ideal candidate is expected to have deep knowledge about various technical areas in agriculture including crops, seed, pests, soil, weather, and other areas in relevance to agriculture & farming. The candidate should also have a strong understanding of various Government and private agricultural programs and processes, evaluation techniques, and policies.




Location - Delhi




ABOUT US



Wadhwani AI is a nonprofit institute building and deploying applied AI solutions to solve critical issues in public health, agriculture, education, and urban development in underserved communities in the global south. We collaborate with governments, social sector organizations, academic and research institutions, and domain experts to identify real-world problems, and develop practical AI solutions to tackle these issues with the aim of making a substantial positive impact.



We have over 30+ AI projects supported by leading philanthropies such as Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, USAID and Google.org. With a team of over 200 professionals, our expertise encompasses AI/ML research and innovation, software engineering, domain knowledge, design and user research.



In the Press:


• Our Founder Donors are among the Top 100 AI Influencers
• G20 India's Presidency: AI Healthcare, Agriculture, & Education Solutions Showcased Globally.
• Unlocking the potentials of AI in Public Health
• Wadhwani AI Takes an Impact-First Approach to Applying Artificial Intelligence - data.org
• Winner of the H&M Foundation Global Change Award 2022
• Indian Winners of the 2019 Google AI Impact Challenge, and the first in the Asia Pacific to host Google Fellows






ROLES & RESPONSIBILITIES


• Will be responsible to identify the need for Agriculture research in the various use cases and design the scientific research parameters for the same.
• Liaison with various research institutions and Agriculture Experts and lead the Agri-research work in collaboration with them and with programs by doing a series of field experiments.
• Designing/planning/Guiding/visiting farm fields, farmers, and researchers for the field research and data collection and support research activities, as and when needed or required in agriculture and allied fields.
• Working closely with third-party research agencies to do evaluation studies and research findings.
• Actively engage in data analysis and work closely with researchers for putting that into use.
• Will be responsible for, write-up the drafts of the results of field trials/POC, field experiments, and piloting of the solutions for presenting to the teams as well help in writing academic papers, policy briefs, presentations, etc.
• Provide regular update reports to Principal Investigators, research staff, and other team members.
• Will prepare and propose datasets requirements in agriculture and allied areas and will build data collection mechanisms in discussions with Research, Program & Product, Engineering teams.
• Will write proposals for solution validation, experimentation, etc to be submitted to Research Institutions as and when required.
• Will develop and maintain relationships with research institutes and scientist's community of agriculture and allied areas for acknowledgment management and various requirements for the solutions.






REQUIREMENTS


• Preferred Ph.D. in agriculture entomology, plant physiology, agronomy, agrometeorology with minimum 5-8 years of work experience in agriculture research, research-oriented programs, or M.Sc. in Entomology/Agronomy/Pathology/Physiology with minimum 8-12 years of work experience as a Researcher in organizations/ projects engaged in agriculture product development, seed improvement, contract farming, crop and yield modeling, climate-resilient agriculture, etc.
• Design research experience with users from diverse backgrounds, preferably including some experience with rural, underprivileged, or other vulnerable groups
• Willing to travel extensively and excited to get on the ground in rural settings. Knowledge of a wide range of qualitative and quantitative research methods, such as lab-based usability studies. research, usability inspections, creation of user profiles or personas, participatory design, survey research, experiment design, and statistical analysis.
• Must be fluent in English & Hindi; multiple Indian languages is a plus.
• Understanding of the strengths and shortcomings of various research methods, including when and how to apply them during each product phase.