Reports to: Managing Director / Estate Owner
Direct reports: Section heads and farm staff
Location: Tanzania (on-site, accommodation provided)
Contract: Full-time
Job Purpose
Lead the day-to-day operational, technical and commercial management of a dairy and livestock farm. Drive productivity, animal health, biosecurity and profitability while building local technical capability and ensuring full compliance with Tanzanian veterinary, environmental and labour legislation.
Key Responsibilities
Dairy:
- Run the dairy operation end-to-end: herd health, nutrition, breeding, milk hygiene, parlour performance, milk yields and quality (somatic cell count, bactoscan, butterfat/protein).
- Set and monitor herd KPIs: calving interval, conception rate, mortality, growth rates, feed conversion, milk per cow per day.
- Manage AI programmes, bull selection and genetic improvement.
- Ensure feed and forage strategy matches herd requirements year-round, including dry-season planning.
Veterinary & Livestock Health:
- Direct veterinary care across all livestock — diagnose and treat common conditions, manage vaccination and parasite-control programmes (tick-borne diseases including East Coast Fever, anaplasmosis, babesiosis; FMD, LSD, CBPP, brucellosis, trypanosomiasis where applicable).
- Lead herd health planning, biosecurity, quarantine and movement protocols.
- Oversee maternity, calf-rearing and replacement heifer programmes.
- Maintain accurate veterinary records, medicines management and withdrawal compliance.
Operations, Compliance & Finance:
- Own the annual operating budget and capital expenditure plan; report monthly on P&L, cost per litre, cost per kg, and enterprise gross margins.
- Maintain compliance with Tanzanian regulations: Ministry of Livestock & Fisheries, TVLA, TBS, OSHA, NEMC, and local district authorities.
- Manage biosecurity, traceability and food safety standards.
- Oversee machinery, workshop, vehicles, fuel and parts stock.
- Manage procurement, supplier relationships and contractor performance.
People & Leadership:
- Lead, train and develop section heads and farm staff; build local technical capacity.
- Set clear performance standards, manage discipline and uphold a strong safety culture.
- Work effectively with Tanzanian staff across cultural and language lines; partner with community stakeholders.
Key Performance Indicators:
- Milk yield per cow, herd fertility metrics, livestock mortality, cost of production per litre/kg, labour productivity, EBITDA against budget, zero major regulatory or biosecurity breaches, staff retention and training delivered.
Person Specification
Essential:
- Degree in Veterinary Medicine or Animal Science (or equivalent); eligibility to register/practise veterinary medicine in Tanzania (or willingness and ability to obtain recognition from the Veterinary Council of Tanzania).
- Minimum 10 years’ progressive experience in dairy and livestock management, with significant time at full farm-manager level.
- Demonstrable hands-on veterinary competence — routine surgery, obstetrics, herd health planning, disease investigation, lab sample handling.
- Proven track record of running a commercial dairy operation with documented improvements in yield, fertility and milk quality.
- Solid commercial and financial acumen — budgeting, costing, capex appraisal, reporting.
- Experience leading multi-disciplinary teams, including training and developing national staff.
- Working knowledge of tropical livestock diseases and vector control.
- Mechanically literate — comfortable around milking plant, generators and farm machinery.
- Fluent English; willingness to learn working Kiswahili (or already conversational).
- Physically fit, resilient, willing to live and work in a rural African setting.
- Clean driving licence; able to obtain a Tanzanian work permit.
Desirable:
- Prior experience working in East Africa or a comparable tropical livestock environment.
- Postgraduate qualification in livestock production, dairy science or tropical agriculture.
- Working Kiswahili.
- Experience with on-farm processing (milk cooling, pasteurisation, value addition).
- AI training and accreditation.
- Experience implementing herd management software (DairyComp, Afimilk, Uniform Agri or similar).
- Familiarity with Tanzanian veterinary, tax and labour law.
Personal Attributes:
- Genuinely hands-on — leads from the front, comfortable in the parlour and paddock.
- Strong team player who builds trust quickly across cultures and hierarchies.
- Calm under pressure, decisive, pragmatic problem-solver.
- High personal integrity and safety standards.
- Self-starter who can operate with limited corporate infrastructure and intermittent connectivity.
- Patient mentor and developer of people
Application ends on
31 July, 2026