Baboucarr Manneh
Director General, AfricaRice
Dr. Baboucarr Manneh is the Director General of the Africa Rice Center and Regional Director for the CGIAR in West and Central Africa. He has nearly 30 years working experience in food system transformation and climate resilience building in Africa with special expertise in development and dissemination of new crop varieties as well as in seed systems transformation. At AfricaRice, he coordinated rice varietal improvement programs in 18 African countries for over 10 years leading to release of over 80 climate-resilient rice varieties and production and dissemination of over 26,000 tons of rice seeds. Dr Manneh has strong partnerships with national agricultural research and extension systems in Africa and Asia, and with Regional organizations. He has a sound knowledge of the CGIAR and good partnerships with advanced research institutes and international agricultural development and finance organizations in Africa, Europe, Asia and Latin America. He graduated from Wageningen University in Netherlands with a PhD in Plant Breeding, crop physiology and modelling.