Data Scientist

Vacancy Announcement

Data Scientist

About GIZ and the Project

The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is a federally owned international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations. The GIZ Office in Kigali covers GIZ’s portfolio in Rwanda and Burundi and as well as selected regional activities and projects. GIZ Rwanda/Burundi implements projects on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the European Union and other commissioning authorities in the following priority areas: Sustainable Economic Development; Good Governance; Climate, Energy and Sustainable Urban Development; Digital Transformation and Digital Economy; and regional projects in the Great Lakes Region.

At GIZ, we do not just work in international cooperation – we strive to shape the future of sustainable development. Through the AI Hub of the Digital Transformation Center Rwanda, GIZ brings together several initiatives that foster responsible and impactful AI innovation across Africa.

Our Mission? To foster responsible and impactful AI innovation in Africa and to build a thriving, inclusive and locally driven AI ecosystem – one grounded in sound policy, strong skills and real-world use cases that deliver socio-economic impact across the continent.

Our Approach? The AI Hub hosts and connects a range of initiatives that work together to:

• Shape enabling AI policy and responsible, ethical and inclusive AI governance;
• Strengthen skills and capacity across the public sector and the wider AI ecosystem;
• Turn ideas into impact through concrete, scalable AI use cases;
• Grow a vibrant AI community and innovation ecosystem across Africa.

Our Partners? We work hand in hand with governments, civil society, academia and open-source AI communities, foster collaboration between the African and European private sector, and partner with regional organisations such as Smart Africa and the East African Community.

Your Next Career Move? We’re assembling a dynamic, purpose-driven team and are looking for an exceptional Data Scientist with expertise in AI and particularly Natural Language Processing & Machine Translation to help bring this vision to life. This is a hands-on technical role for a builder: you will own the AI Hub’s language-technology products – conversational assistants (chatbots) and machine translation – from concept through to deployment, champion open-source and open-innovation approaches, and help partners and GIZ projects turn AI ideas into working, responsible solutions. If you’re passionate about applied AI, African languages and building technology that lasts, this is your moment.

Responsibilities

The Data Scientist is the technical owner of the AI Hub’s Natural Language Processing & Machine Translation products and a hands-on advisor to partners and GIZ projects. The role spans three interlinked areas – product ownership, AI use-case development and technical advisory – and is tasked with:

• Owning the AI Hub’s products in the areas of conversational AI and machine translation – from concept and design through development, testing, deployment and iteration – with a strong emphasis on African languages and low-resource NLP.
• Championing open-source and open-innovation approaches, including responsible use, adaptation, fine-tuning and release of open models, datasets and tools, and the building of local capacity to sustain them.
• Facilitating structured assessments of potential AI use cases – from problem framing and feasibility through data readiness, technical scoping and prioritisation – to detect where AI can deliver real socio-economic value.
• Advising other GIZ projects and partners on the design, procurement, integration and quality assurance of NLP, machine translation and broader AI solutions.
• Embedding responsible, ethical and inclusive AI practices across the product lifecycle, including data protection, privacy, fairness, transparency and mitigation of language and representation bias.
• Ensuring effective project and product management across the assigned workstreams, including planning, budgeting, steering of contractors, and monitoring and evaluation.
• Building and maintaining relationships with diverse stakeholders across Rwanda and the region – government, academia, start-ups, developer and open-source communities – and identifying synergies across GIZ projects and networks.

Tasks

Product ownership – Chatbots & Machine Translation:

• Define and keep the product roadmap, technical requirements and quality standards for the AI Hub’s chatbot and machine translation products.
• create, adapt and fine-tune NLP and machine translation models, prioritising open-source foundations and African-language coverage, and build reusable datasets, pipelines and evaluation methods.
• Oversee deployment, monitoring, iteration and documentation of products, ensuring they are robust, maintainable and locally sustainable.

AI Use Cases:

• Facilitate assessments of potential AI use cases with partners and GIZ projects, translating needs into clear problem statements, feasibility analyses and technical scopes.
• assist the design, implementation and quality assurance of scalable AI services, including documentation of requirements, architecture and lessons learned for scale-up.
• Facilitate partnerships that bring together public institutions, private sector actors, research bodies and open-source communities to co-design and co-execute use cases.

Technical Advisory:

• Advise GIZ projects across the portfolio on responsible AI, NLP and machine translation – from early ideation to procurement, integration and evaluation.
• Contribute to responsible AI practices across the project lifecycle, including risk identification and mitigation related to data protection, privacy, fairness, transparency and accountability.
• Communicate complex technical concepts and the socio-economic implications of AI to diverse, including non-technical, audiences.

Cross-cutting:

• Steer and quality-assure the work of external service providers and contractors, including terms of reference, deliverable reviews and implementation follow-up.
• Organise and facilitate technical working sessions, workshops, community meetups and trainings, ensuring structured preparation, effective moderation and clear follow-up.
• produce and evaluate concept notes, technical documentation, briefings, reports and communication materials that assist decision-making and outreach.
• Facilitate knowledge exchange between the AI Hub, relevant GIZ programmes and regional or global open-source and NLP communities.
• Take on any additional project-related responsibilities as assigned by management.

Required Qualifications, Competences and Experience

Qualifications and professional experience

• Master’s degree in computer science, data science, computational linguistics, engineering, information systems or a related technical field.
• At least 3 years of professional experience in a similar role, with proven exposure to building and deploying AI or data-driven solutions and to advising stakeholders in complex, multi-actor settings.
• Strong technical expertise in Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Machine Translation, including hands-on experience developing, adapting, fine-tuning and evaluating language models.
• Demonstrated experience with open-source AI and open-innovation approaches, including working with open models, datasets, frameworks and communities; experience with low-resource and/or African languages is a strong asset.
• Proven ability to own a technical product or solution end to end – from requirements and design through deployment, iteration and documentation.
• Experience working with diverse stakeholders in Rwanda and/or the region, including public sector, academia, start-ups and developer communities.
• Demonstrated experience in managing contractors or technical vendors, including translating requirements into actionable deliverables and ensuring quality assurance.
• Sound understanding of responsible, ethical and inclusive AI practices, with the ability to apply these principles in practical implementation contexts.
• Strong writing, documentation and communication skills.

Additional skills required

• Strong ability to communicate complex technical concepts and the socio-economic implications of AI solutions to diverse (including non-technical) audiences.
• Outstanding work ethic and motivation to act reliably, dedicatedly and disciplined without much guidance and supervision.
• High level of intercultural competence, diplomacy and stakeholder management skills.
• Ability to work independently, across diverse teams, and under tight deadlines in a dynamic, multi-stakeholder environment.
• Strong service-oriented thinker able to deliver professional and proactive advisory to GIZ and GIZ partner organisations.
• Brings intellectual curiosity, critical thinking and problem-solving skills.
• Ability to execute multiple processes simultaneously.
• Previous working experience with GIZ and/or pan-African organisations is an asset.
• Proactive, collaborative and able to work confidently in intercultural environments.
• Proficiency in English (both oral and written) is required; knowledge of French, Kinyarwanda and/or other African languages is an advantage.

GIZ will only assess applications which meet the following criteria:

• Cover Letter must clearly state your motivation for applying for the position and outline your competencies why you are the best suited candidate addressing qualifications, competencies and experiences asked for in this advert. Cover Letter must not exceedone (1) page and be submitted in PDF Format.
• CVs must include three professional references of previous employment including contact details and must not exceed four (4) pages to be submitted in PDF format.
• How to apply

Interested candidates should submit their application (motivation letter, updated CV, certificates and references), via our electronic job portal by using the button “apply”;until 24 September 2026 at 4:00 PM. All attachments should be put together in one PDF file not larger than 2 MB.

GIZ is a signatory of the Diversity Charter. Recognition, appreciation and inclusion of diversity in the company are important to us. All employees shall be valued - regardless of gender and gender identity, nationality, ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, social background, age or sexual orientation. We assist equal opportunities and welcome applications from people with disabilities. 

This includes the provision of reasonable accommodation, if needed, in order to participate in the job application and interview process and to perform essential job functions. Please let us know if you have any particular requirements should you be invited for assessment/interview or that you wish us to consider, when considering your application. 

Women and persons with disabilities are particularly encouraged to apply.

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted for test and interview.

GIZ Office Rwanda

KN 41 St. / Nr.17, Kiyovu 

P.O. Box 59, Kigali, 

Rwanda

GIZ reserves all rights!