About TechnoServe:

Everyone deserves the opportunity to build a better future. This simple idea has been at the heart of TechnoServe’s work around the world for over 50 years. TechnoServe is a pioneer in leveraging the power of businesses and markets to create sustainable pathways out of poverty.

The low-income communities in which we work are full of enterprising people. Their small-scale farms and businesses are the keys to economic development. But they face many challenges: low literacy, lack of access to jobs and markets, unpredictable political dynamics, and, increasingly, the effects of climate change. For many women and young people, the challenges are even more daunting. Working with TechnoServe staff, people around the world are lifting themselves out of poverty. The results are amazing...when incomes increase and living conditions for families get better, they are able to access health care and education previously out of reach. Communities and even whole countries are better off.

Internship Objective:

The objective of this internship is to create a mobile application that runs on both Android and iOS devices, allowing wet mills and coffee washing stations to seamlessly evaluate both quality and sustainability metrics on a daily basis.

TechnoServe through its Rwanda Ikawa Nziza Cyane (Rwanda INC) program, has worked with National Agricultural Export Development Board (NAEB) and Coffee Quality Institute (CQI) , a non-profit organization working internationally to improve the quality of coffee and the lives of people who produce it, to develop two critical guidelines: The CPQI (Coffee Processing Quality Index), which is a set of standards guiding coffee processors on how to implement and monitor best practices for all stages of coffee wet mill operations, and CPSI (Coffee Processing Sustainability Index), a set of standards providing a framework for the implementation and monitoring of sustainable agronomic, social, environmental and business practices at all levels of coffee production and processing.

Today, these two standard checklists are accessed through a paper, and there are a set of challenges associated with this:

• The information is not stored in a structured database
• No automated scoring mechanism
• Sharing quality information is not flexible
• The current approach is not user friendly and can lead to errors

This internship is intended to:

• Develop a standalone mobile application that runs on both Android and iOS devices
• Integration with CPQI and CPSI tools
• Add a way to export the database and and share externally

Implementation Focus

• Region: Kigali/Rwanda
• Program: Rwanda INC
• Technology: Flutter, Android Studio, Relational and Non-Relational DB, and other mobile application development technologies

Key Activities and Deliverables

The project will involve working with the TechnoServe Labs and Rwanda INC team.

Tasks will include:

• Design wireframes of the mobile application
• Participate in grooming user stories, prioritization and handle them from the TechnoServe Labs’s project management tool, using Agile
• Implement an offline mobile application for CPQI and CPSI
• Participate in QAs and UATs and fix bugs as they get reported
• Deploy the mobile application to the TechnoServe Labs’ app stores
• Document the source codes, push them to the TechnoServe Labs’ repository
• Other documentations such as architecture design and user guides

Key deliverables include:

• A CPQI & CPSI mobile application deployed to Google Play Store
• A CPQI & CPSI mobile application deployed to Apple Store
• Source codes pushed to the TechnoServe’s repository
• Documentation of the solution and user guides
• Training the end users

Outputs will be immediately put to use by field teams. Interns will have significant exposure to cross-sectional teams for collaboration and management.

Qualifications and Skills Required:

• A senior year or a completed student of an undergraduate degree or Master’s degree program in computer science, software engineering, information technology or related field of study
• Android and iOS app development using Flutter or any other native application development tool such as Java for Android, Kotlin and Swift.
• Agile development methodologies (i.e Scrum), and Trello.
• Attention to detail and ability to work collaboratively with both in-person and remote team members.
• Professional proficiency in English and Kinyarwanda is preferred, thus ability to effectively communicate in both languages, written and orally is desired.
• Excellent technical presentation and problem solving skills would be an added advantage.

Period: Jan 15, 2022- April 15, 2022 (4 months) with possibility of extension.

We encourage all qualified individuals who share TechnoServe's vision of improving the lives of others through proven business solutions to apply.

With our commitment to diversity, we are proud to be an equal opportunity employer and affirmative action employer and do not discriminate on the basis of gender, race, color, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, HIV/AIDS status, protected veteran status, disability and all other protected classes.

We are also proud of our commitment to protecting staff, partners, and beneficiaries from abuse and exploitation and thoroughly vet all final candidates through rigorous background and reference checks.