New members appointed to World Vegetable Center Board of Directors

The World Vegetable Center is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Julie Howard, Prof. Richard Ellis, and Dr. Hsueh-Shih Lin to the Center’s Board of Directors. The announcement was made during the 51^st meeting of the board, held from 25-27 April 2017 in Seoul, South Korea.

Dr. Howard currently serves as Senior Adviser to the Associate Provost and Dean, International Studies and Programs at Michigan State University (MSU), USA. From 2011-2014 she served as Chief Scientist for the Bureau for Food Security and Senior Adviser to the Administrator for Agricultural Research, Extension and Education in the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). Dr. Howard was a senior leader of USAID’s Feed the Future initiative, establishing a US$ 47 million program with the New Alliance for a Green Revolution to scale the use of improved seeds and technologies in Africa. She has a Ph.D. in Agricultural Economics from MSU.

Professor Ellis is Director of Health Partnerships and Professor of Crop Production at the University of Reading, UK. He has held the latter post since 1995, and was Dean of the Faculty of Life Sciences 2008-2016. He is the author of 342 publications on topics in anhydrous biology (modeling the effect of the environment on the survival of seeds, spores, and pollen to predict longevity); the impact of climate change on crop production and quality; phenology (modeling the effect of environment and genotype on plant development); and agronomy. He has a long record of collaborative research on seed and crop physiology, plant breeding, agronomy, and crop genetic resources conservation with international agricultural research centers including Bioversity International, International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA), and the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI). He received his Ph.D. in Agriculture from the University of Reading.

Dr. Lin has been Director of the Taichung District Agricultural Research and Extension Station in Taiwan since 2014 and Chairman of the Taiwan Society for Horticultural Science since 2015. He holds a Ph.D. in Plant Breeding from Wageningen Agricultural University, specializing in cucurbit breeding and plant tissue culture.

“The scope of experience Drs. Howard, Ellis and Lin have in horticultural research and international development will strengthen the Center’s ability to deliver research with impact,” said Marco Wopereis, WorldVeg Director General. ‘We are grateful for their participation.”

In other board news, Dr. Junne-Jih Chen was appointed as the new Chair, effective immediately. Dr. Chen is Director General of the Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute, and has been a board member since 2011. The Board also approved the appointment of Dr. Masa Iwanaga, President, Japan International Research Center for Agricultural Sciences (JIRCAS), as the Vice-Chair as of 8 December 2017. Up to December 8, Dr. David Sammons, Dean of the International Center, University of Florida will continue to function as the Center’s Vice-Chair.

Ms. Cathy Reade, Director, Public Affairs and Communication for the Crawford Fund, will take over as Chair of the Nomination Committee and Mr. Gordon MacNeil, President, XCG Consulting, Inc. as Chair of the Audit Committee. Dr. Marlis Lindecke, Senior Programme Manager, Advisory Service on Agricultural Research for Development (BEAF), Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) continues in her role as the Chair of the Program Committee.

Board members Ms. Emmy Simmons and Mr. Jon Wilkinson completed their terms of service, and both were thanked for their valuable guidance to the Center.