Field QA Manager: Crop Quality & Compliance Leader

Role title

Quality Assurance Manager (QA Manager)

Department

Quality Assurance and Food Safety / Operations

Location

Field-based; regular work across farms, aggregation points, fulfilment centres, packhouses, warehouses and shipment locations

Grade

Manager level; final internal grade/band subject to the approved job-grading framework

Reports to

Chief Operations Officer

Direct reports

None initially; leads through quality standards, audit authority, corrective-action governance and shipment release decisions

PRIMARY MANDATE:
Ensure at least 98% of released crop deliveries meet the agreed buyer specification and applicable food standards, while maintaining a non-negotiable control that 100% of shipments receive documented QA release before departure.

Detailed responsibilities

Quality-management system, SOPs and control architecture

• Design, maintain and enforce the end-to-end quality-assurance framework for every crop and trade lane, covering farms, growers, agents, suppliers, aggregation points, fulfilment centres, packhouses, warehouses, transport, ports and delivery interfaces.
• Convert applicable buyer, legal, certification and internal requirements into controlled SOPs, SLAs, work instructions, inspection checklists, acceptance criteria, sampling plans, forms and evidence standards.
• Define critical-to-quality attributes, food-safety hazards, preventive controls, operational prerequisites and critical control points where applicable; ensure monitoring and escalation are practical for field execution.
• Maintain a controlled document register, revision history and distribution process so teams use the current approved specification and procedure.
• Establish the quality RACI for Agronomy, Field Operations, Crop Sourcing, Procurement, Production, Inventory, Logistics, Sales and Customer Success, with clear handoffs and escalation ownership.
• Review the quality system after buyer complaints, audit findings, new crops, new markets, new suppliers, new locations, process changes or material changes in buyer requirements.

Trade-specific quality planning and buyer-specification control

• Obtain the final approved buyer specification, contract quality terms, destination-market requirements, test methods, tolerances, packaging and labelling requirements before production or sourcing commitments are operationalized.
• Prepare a quality plan for each material trade that identifies specification parameters, risks, inspection points, sampling frequency, required laboratories, records, release criteria and accountable process owners.
• Run pre-trade quality-readiness reviews with Commercial, Agronomy, Crop Sourcing, Supply Chain, Production and Logistics and document gaps, owners and go/no-go conditions.
• Control specification changes and ensure any buyer-approved concession or deviation is documented before release; prevent verbal or retrospective changes from being treated as approval.
• Maintain a crop and buyer specification library that is searchable, version-controlled and linked to the relevant purchase, production, inventory and shipment records.

Production, grower and supplier quality assurance

• Work with Agronomy to verify that production protocols, approved inputs, application records, pre-harvest intervals, harvest-maturity criteria and crop-specific food-safety controls are defined and evidenced.
• Conduct risk-based farm, grower, cooperative, agent and supplier audits and verify corrective actions before high-risk supply is accepted.
• Establish supplier and grower approval, probation, suspension and requalification criteria using quality history, audit performance, traceability, complaints and corrective-action responsiveness.
• Verify harvest readiness against buyer specification, crop maturity, expected defects, residue or contamination risk, weather exposure, handling capacity and packaging readiness.
• Coordinate representative field or pre-harvest sampling and approved laboratory testing where required; preserve sample identity, chain of custody and result integrity.
• Train and coach growers, agents and operating teams on quality standards without taking over Agronomy's technical ownership or Operations' execution accountability.

Receiving, aggregation, inventory and processing controls

• Ensure every incoming lot is uniquely identified, weighed, sampled, inspected and graded against the approved crop and trade criteria before acceptance into controlled inventory.
• Verify crop-specific parameters such as variety, maturity, size, appearance, defects, foreign matter,…