Former minister of Agriculture, Mr Akinwumi Adesina was today invested as the 8th elected President of the African Development Bank at the Palais des Congrès of Sofitel Hôtel Ivoire in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, in the presence of Alassane Ouattara, President of the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire, Nigerian Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo and outgoing AfDB President, Donald Kaberuka, among other dignitaries.
Akinwumi Adesina received a bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Economics from the Old University of Ife (Obafemi Awolowo University, Ife, Nigeria), his Msc and PhD in Agricultural Economics from Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, United States.
Akinwumi Adesina worked at the Rockefeller Foundation since winning a fellowship from the Foundation as a senior scientist in 1988. From 1999 to 2003 he was the representative of the Foundation for the southern African area. From 2003 until 2008 to the present he was an associate director for food security.
He was vice president for policy and partnerships at the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) from 2007 until his appointment as Nigerian Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development 2010. He introduced innovative programs that empowered more than six million farmers and shifted Nigerian agriculture toward a more business-oriented industry. He also led financing initiatives to support youth engagement in agriculture as well as small and medium enterprises. In 2013, he was named as Forbes African Person of the Year.
On May 28, 2015, he was elected to become the next President of the African Development Bank. He will begin his tenure of the office today September 1, 2015. He is the eight president in the organization’s history, and the first Nigerian to hold the post.