Seminar

Shenggen Fan has been Director General of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) since 2009. Growing up in rural China in the 1960s and 1970s, Fan became deeply committed to reducing poverty and hunger. He is convinced that innovative, country-owned, country-led approaches are required to achieve ambitious development goals. Along those lines, he recently proposed a new “business-as-unusual” approach to ending hunger: (1) invest in two core pillars—agriculture and social protection, (2) bring in new players, (3) adopt a country-led, bottom-up approach, (4) design policies using evidence and experience, and (5) measure whether commitments have been fulfilled.

Fan joined IFPRI in 1995 as a research fellow, conducting extensive research on pro-poor development strategies in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. He led IFPRI’s program on public investment before becoming the director of the Institute’s Development Strategy and Governance Division in 2005. He also received a PhD in applied economics from the University of Minnesota and bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Nanjing Agricultural University in China. Fan is a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Food Security, as well as an Executive Committee member of the International Association of Agricultural Economists.

Francis Chabari is a senior livestock expert with over 43 years of experience working with pastoralists and agro-pastoralists in livestock research and managing development programs. He is a regionally recognized expert on pastoral livestock issues and livestock products marketing and has spent his career addressing the constraints and challenges facing pastoralist communities in Kenya. He currently holds the position of Chief of Party of the USAID-funded Kenya Drylands Livestock Development program, a livestock value chain program focusing on enhancing household incomes and food security of the pastoralists of north eastern Kenya. Before joining CNFA, he worked for Tufts University as Chief of Party of the Pastoral Areas Coordination, Analysis and Policy Support (PACAPS) program of the Regional Enhanced Livelihoods in Pastoral Areas, a program funded by USAID-East Africa. He has also worked with the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) and the Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). He started his career as an Agricultural Officer with the Government of Kenya. He holds a Masters in Agricultural Economics from the University of Nairobi and a Bachelors in Range Management from New Mexico State University.

An expert in livestock production with over 20 years work experience, Jurjen Draaijer currently works for CNFA as Livestock Team Leader in USAID funded Partnership for Economic Growth based in Hargeisa, Somaliland. He has been working in the livestock sector focusing on pastoralism and drought preparedness throughout the Horn of Africa for over six years. Before joining CNFA, he was working for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations since 1998. He has extensive experience in a range of developing countries in Latin America, Near-East, Asia, and Africa, and has particular specializations in small scale dairy production, animal nutrition, pastoralism, and pastoral field schools. He is an accredited trainer in LEGS (livestock emergency guidelines and standards). He received his MSc from Wageningen University in the Netherlands.

John McPeak is currently an associate professor and vice chair in the Department of Public Administration and International Affairs in the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. He teaches microeconomics and development economics at the graduate level. He spent three years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Senegal. He received his master’s and PhD from the graduate program in agricultural economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, conducting field work in northern Kenya that served as the basis for his dissertation. After receiving his doctorate in 1999, he took a post-doctoral research associate position with Cornell University assigned to work in Kenya with the USAID / GL-CRSP funded Pastoral Risk Management Project. After three years of field work with this project he joined the faculty of Syracuse University in 2002. He has served as a consultant for DfID, UNDP, and the International Livestock Research Institute. He has continued to conduct research in Kenya, Ethiopia, Senegal, and Mali largely focused on livestock production, marketing, and livestock crop interactions, and recently published in collaboration with Peter Little and Cheryl Doss the book Risk and Social Change in an African Rural Economy: Livelihoods in Pastoralist Communities. McPeak is currently a co-PI for the Livestock-CC CRSP’s MLPI-2 project in Mali.

Assistant Administrator Nancy Lindborg brings a wealth of development and humanitarian aid insight to the Bureau for Democracy, Conflict and Humanitarian Assistance (DCHA). Nancy has spent the last 14 years as president of Mercy Corps, a non-governmental organization (NGO) that helps people in the world’s toughest places turn the crises of natural disaster, poverty, and conflict into opportunities for progress. Under her guidance and strategic vision, Mercy Corps has grown into a respected international relief and development organization and is known for addressing challenges with responsive, innovative programming. Nancy also served as co-president on the Board of Directors for the U.S. Global Leadership Campaign. She was co-chair of the National Committee on North Korea where she led efforts to advance, promote, and facilitate engagement between citizens of the United States and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and was a member of the USAID Advisory Committee on Voluntary Foreign Aid.

From 2000 to 2005, she was chair of the Sphere Management Committee, an international initiative to improve the effectiveness and accountability of NGOs. From 1998 to 2002, Lindborg was the co-chair of the InterAction Disaster Response Committee—InterAction is the largest alliance of U.S.-based international NGOs focused on the world's poor and most vulnerable people. Before joining Mercy Corps in 1996, she managed economic development programs as a regional director in post-Soviet Central Asia and worked in the private sector as a public policy consultant in Chicago and San Francisco. She holds a B.A and M.A. in English Literature from Stanford University and an M.A. in Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Gregory C. Gottlieb was named Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator for the USAID Bureau for Food Security in November 2010, where he oversees development activities associated with Feed the Future, the U.S. Government’s global hunger and food security initiative. He most recently served as the Mission Director in Namibia since August 2008. Prior to his assignment to Namibia, he served as Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator of USAID's Bureau for Democracy, Conflict and Humanitarian Assistance. He has more than 25 years of experience with the U.S. government, NGOs, and the UN, primarily in the field of humanitarian relief. He began his USAID career in 1988 as the Disaster Response Coordinator in Malawi, subsequently serving in Sudan, Ethiopia and Kenya. In 1999 he established the first regional USAID Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance in Africa while serving as the Senior Regional Advisor in Kenya. Much of his work has focused on improving disaster assistance as well as humanitarian and transition programs in order to ensure economic recovery. He has also served as a protection officer for UNHCR and as Chief of Party of the USAID-funded Famine Early Warning System. He obtained his Bachelors' Degree from Humboldt State University in California, a Juris Doctor from Loyola Law School, and a Master's Degree from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. He is married and has two children.

Jeff Hill has many years of experience in African agricultural development and currently serves in USAID's recently created Bureau for Food Security (BFS). He started his career as a Peace Corps volunteer in Sierra Leone and later served as Associate Peace Corps Director in that country. Prior to USAID, he worked for the World Bank for 10 years in Tanzania and Nigeria. At USAID he has been a team leader for a number of agriculture and food security initiatives for the Africa Bureau and now for BFS. He presently works on Feed the Future initiatives, and prior to that worked on many programs that promoted agricultural growth and built on African-led partnerships to cut hunger and poverty. He has designed, led, and managed a variety of teams on research, private sector development, trade, capacity building and policy. He currently chairs the Donor Development Partners CAADP group and process -- a group of 32 donors worldwide dedicated to African agricultural development. He holds a BS from Weber State University in Utah in public administration and an MS from UC Davis in agricultural economics and agronomy.

Susan Fine is the Director of the Office of East African Affairs in USAID’s Africa Bureau where she oversees programs in the Horn of Africa and the Great Lakes countries. A Senior Foreign Service officer, she has extensive experience planning and managing international development programs. She was most recently the Deputy Mission Director responsible for southern Sudan during southern Sudan’s historic self-determination referendum and subsequent transition to independence. Prior to that, she guided program policy in USAID’s Office of the Chief Operating Officer and served as Director of Strategic Planning and Operations in the Bureau for Asia and the Middle East. She began her USAID career in Swaziland and subsequently served in Uganda, South Africa and Senegal. She holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Colby College and a master’s degree in public policy from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.

Thomas Beck is Senior Advisor in the Policy Office of the Policy, Planning and Learning Bureau (PPL) of USAID. He advises the Agency on resilience and food security issues. He has extensive experience in the areas of international organizations, conflict prevention and post conflict reconstruction. He was co-leader of a small USAID team which had lead responsibility for drafting the U.S. Strategy for Meeting the Millennium Development Goals which the President presented at the 2010 MDG Summit. Recently, he served as Senior Advisor to USAID’s Bureau for Food Security and the Office of the Deputy Coordinator for the Presidential initiative, Feed the Future.

He served at USAID previously during the Clinton administration as Senior Advisor for Conflict Prevention and Peace Building, where he was a leader in introducing conflict prevention into the international development agenda. He also served USAID as Senior Advisor for UN Affairs, where he represented the Agency before a variety of UN bodies and assisted in the reform of the UN’s humanitarian functions. He has served as a consultant on international organizations and conflict and peace building issues. As an attorney, he practiced many years in Alaska where he represented Alaska Native corporations and non-profit organizations. He is a graduate of Case Western Reserve University Law School and holds an LLM in international law from the London School of Economics and Political Science