The mission of the Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF) as a nationally and internationally active research institute is to deliver solutions for an ecologically, economically and socially sustainable agriculture – together with society. ZALF is a member of the Leibniz Association and is located in Müncheberg (approx. 35 minutes by regional train from Berlin-Lichtenberg). It also maintains a research station with further locations in Dedelow and Paulinenaue.

The Research Data Management Working Group at ZALF is looking for a research assistant for data management tasks within the framework of the European Partnership of Agriculture of Data. This partnership aims to enhance climate, environmental, and socio-economic sustainability and productivity in agriculture and to strengthen policy monitoring and evaluation capacities by exploiting the potential of Earth and environmental observation and other data, in combination with innovative data technologies.

We are looking for a new colleague to join our team at our Müncheberg site for the initial period from 01.02.2026 to 30.09.2027 in a full-time-position. The position can then be extended for a further 5 years, subject to the planned project extension.

• develop and maintain standardized data workflows and pipelines for the acquisition, quality assurance, and publication of research data (e.g., sensor, field)
• coordinate and document data flows between citizen-science platforms, AI processing pipelines, and institutional or external repositories to ensure data integrity and traceability
• implement and promote FAIR data principles through the harmonization of metadata, development of metadata catalogues of methods and models, and integration into the project’s Data Management Plan (DMP)
• you will support the publication of data in accordance with FAIR principles and identify user needs for RDM
• as part of the European Partnership of Agriculture of Data and ZALF RDM network, you will support the agricultural science community relating to RDM (e.g., data documentation, publication, and reuse)
• you will work with the institutional RDM at ZALF and you will network with other data stewards (e.g., in FAIRagro)

• university degree, preferably a doctorate, in a scientific field with a clear connection to ZALF's research
• you have a solid understanding of agrosystem data, its scales (e.g., plants, cultivation trials, fields, and landscapes), and various data formats (e.g., farm and management data, time series, long-term field experiments, geodata such as remote sensing)
• very good knowledge of research data management, including geodata, with knowledge of metadata and data publication standards
• you love working in a service-oriented way
• high degree of initiative, excellent communication and teamwork skills in an interdisciplinary environment
• as an internationally research institution, located in Germany we require good to very good written and spoken German and English skills

• long-term prospects and a salary structure according to the TV-L, up to E13 collective agreement for the German states
• a collegial and open-minded working environment in a dynamic research institution
• career support through continuing education
• work-life balance, certified by the Work and Family Audit
• excellent connections to Berlin with the offer of a job ticket (Germany Ticket subsidy)
• company ticket

ZALF promotes equality among all employees and welcomes applications regardless of ethnic, cultural, or social background, age, religion, ideology, disability, gender, or sexual identity. The filling of the position in part-time is possible in principle. Please send your application preferably online (see button online application below). For e-mail applications, create a PDF document (one PDF file, max. 5 MB; packed PDF documents, archive files like zip, rar etc. Word documents cannot be processed and therefore cannot be considered!) with the usual documents, in particular CV, proof of qualification and certificates, stating the reference number 64-2025 until 15 November 2025 to (see button e-mail application below).

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us: Nikolai Svoboda, Tel. 033432/82-382, Kristin Meier, Tel. 033432/82-310.

For cost reasons, application documents or extensive publications can only be returned if an adequately stamped envelope is attached.

If you apply, we collect and process your personal data in accordance with Articles 5 and 6 of the EU GDPR only for the processing of your application and for purposes that result from possible future employment with the ZALF. Your data will be deleted after six months.