Agriculture Program Lead, The AI Access Initiative

About The AI Access Initiative

We're at an inflection point in artificial intelligence - presenting both tremendous potential opportunity and risk for people in developing countries. Low-income countries have an opportunity to leapfrog development milestones with AI-powered innovations. Incubated at Evidence Action, we're launching The AI Access Initiative, an organization focused on scaling AI-enabled 'big bets' to benefit tens or hundreds of millions of people in poverty in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).

We will operate at the intersection of global development actors, top AI labs, and leading researchers to drive meaningful access to the benefits of AI for the 3.5 billion people living in poverty globally. We will create "public good," open-sourced playbooks, toolkits, and insights that define how to design and launch tractable and impactful AI-enabled programs.

We are led by former Evidence Action CEO Kanika Bahl, a founding member of Anthropic's Long-Term Benefit Trust, and advised by Nobel Laureate Michael Kremer; Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic; and Kent Walker, President, Global Affairs for Alphabet and Google. This work builds on Evidence Action's track record reaching 530M+ people with cost-effective, evidence-based programs across 9 countries in Africa and Asia, with a focus on last-mile delivery.

Our Approach

We're scaling AI-enabled big bets to benefit tens or hundreds of millions, such as delivering AI-enabled forecasts to smallholder farmers to improve yields and earnings, leveraging AI to dramatically improve medical diagnosis and treatment, implementing frontier systems to identify and mitigate disease outbreaks, or putting personalized AI tutors into the hands of students to drive reductions to system-level educational attainment gaps.

As part of this work, we will create "public good," open-sourced playbooks, toolkits, and insights that define how to design and launch tractable and impactful AI-enabled programs. When relevant, we will partner with leading AI labs to shape technical offerings, including adapting for underrepresented languages, bandwidth constraints, etc.

Partnering with governments in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) to drive regulatory changes, policy, and investments necessary to unlock beneficial use cases at national scale, while proactively mitigating the downside risks of AI.

Building on our recent analysis of near and medium-term AI opportunities in LMICs, we are advancing the highest-scoring interventions through a rigorous vetting process, including evidence reviews, cost-effectiveness analyses, risk assessments, and early operational/technical scoping.

The Role

We are seeking a rigorous, high-ownership, and fast-paced Agriculture Program Lead to join our founding team and lead the design and execution of our Agriculture portfolio: starting with AI-enabled weather forecasting and advisory services for smallholder farmers, with potential to expand into adjacent agriculture interventions over time.

You will play a pivotal role in translating cutting-edge forecasting science into government-ready solutions at scale, bridging worlds between AI labs and research institutions (e.g., university forecasting groups), global development partners, frontline implementers, and smallholder farmers across LMICs.

Requirements

• 5-10+ years' experience as a builder in international development.
• A proven track record of significantly scaling organizations and/or programs to deliver impact for millions, preferably in close partnership with national governments.
• Training or early career experience in a high-rigor environment (e.g., top-tier management consulting, high-growth NGO program leadership, strategy/econ research) and the ability to rapidly get up to speed in new technical areas including AI/ML forecasting concepts.
• Demonstrated success leading international development programs from idea to scaled delivery, including managing multi-stakeholder coalitions with governments, research institutions, NGO implementers, and private sector partners.
• A track record as a strong people manager and builder: able to set clear standards, empower others, and cultivate a high-performance culture across distributed and field-based teams.
• Experience working with Asian and/or African governments to drive large-scale change, with a strong preference for direct experience working with Indian state governments, ministries of agriculture, or national meteorological agencies.
• High EQ and the ability to influence across diverse partners, from AI/forecasting researchers to frontline delivery staff to senior government officials.
• Strong fluency with AI tools, and eager to experiment, learn, and adapt to emerging technologies.
• Comfort with ambiguity and fast iteration; can define and test hypotheses, adapt quickly, and maintain focus on impact.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; able to synthesize complex technical ideas into crisp narratives for different audiences.
• Willingness and ability to travel extensively internationally (20-40%), with significant time expected in India and other priority geographies.
• Passion for the mission of ensuring that the benefits of frontier AI reach the world's poorest populations, while mitigating its downside risks.

Position Location

This role location is flexible anywhere within the United States for fully remote candidates. Please note this role requires significant travel (20-40%) to partner countries.

Benefits

The expected role range for this US position is listed below. We consider multiple factors when determining the base salary for a role, including but not limited to: role scope, program budgets, internal equity, and a candidate's qualifications and/or prior experience.

Note: Pay and benefits will be commensurate with the role specifications, local statutory requirements, and the cost of labor in the markets where we operate.

The pay range for this role: $155,000-$170,000 per year.

This role will initially be housed at Evidence Action, with the explicit plan to transfer with the AI Access Initiative as a founding member of the team when that project is spun out as a new entity later this year.

At that point, benefits and policies may change.

For US based roles, Evidence Action provides comprehensive benefits including international health care, HSA/FSA options, life insurance, disability coverage, retirement plans with a matching component, generous and flexible leave options, as well as other employee perks on a reimbursement basis.

For more information visit our careers page or ask our recruiting team!