BOARD OF DIRECTORS
IITA-BIP BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Nkiru M. Okpareke
Nkiru is the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Enviro Gro Farms – a company she co-founded to produce high-end vegetables for the Nigerian Market. It is a premier commercial grower and marketer of fine quality vegetables in Nigeria. Nkiru has over twenty years working experience with a decade of that experience in ExxonMobil as a project and design engineer and project manager for infrastructure projects in Nigeria, United States, Singapore and France. Nkiru has a B.Eng in Engineering from the University of Port-Harcourt and an MBA from the Schulich School of Business, York University, Canada. In 2015, she won an award from The Centre For Value Leadership (CVL) as an Outstanding Female Entrepreneur in the Agricultural Sector. She is also a Fellow of the Cochran Program of the United States Department of Agriculture and a fellow of the United State department of States International Visitors Leadership Program (IVLP) under the African Women Entrepreneurship Program (AWEP). Nkiru currently provides research support for the production of consistent insect frass and insect meal in line with global standards to Protein Kapital Ltd on the various projects they are working on. She is the board chair of IITA, Business Incubation Platform (BIP) and also the board chair of AgriDrive Nigeria and Kenya where she is in charge of strategic management of the board.
Adebowale Akande
Dr. Debo Akande is a distinguished international development expert with over 25 years of experience handling global agribusiness portfolios and investments. He is a Director at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, managing a regional portfolio that includes the CEO of the IITA Business Incubation platform, the Head of the IITA Mechanization Unit, and the lead of the Innovation & Product Development Unit. He also holds senior government positions as Executive Adviser on International Development Cooperation and Director-General of the Oyo State Agribusiness Development Agency, in Oyo State, Nigeria, driving executive leadership overall strategic management of the agribusiness sector and international development.
His work has consistently bridged the gap between research, enterprise, and governance, making him a valuable contributor to boards seeking visionary leadership, cross-sectoral experience, and impact-driven solutions in agriculture and development. Before working at IITA, he was a portfolio manager working with the British government on African Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (AKTP), a global initiative connecting ambitious businesses and organizations with academic experts to turn innovative ideas into reality. He also led the pilot of the global AgResults innovation in research and delivery initiative, driven by a pull mechanism currently being scaled globally, among many others.
He holds a Doctorate in Business Administration from the University of Hertfordshire (UK), specializing in agribusiness policy and strategy. A Fellow of the Chartered Managers Institute (UK), He has received advanced training in Climate Change Management from Oxford University, UK, Food Security Policy from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, and environmental law from UNITAR, Switzerland, reinforcing his ability to align agribusiness strategies with global sustainability goals. He has authored over 20 scholarly articles.
Kenton Dashiell
Kenton Dashiell is the Deputy Director General for Partnerships for Delivery. Dr Dashiell received degrees from Purdue University, Oklahoma State University, and the University of Florida in Agronomy and Crop Breeding.
He was the Soybean Breeder for IITA based in Ibadan, Nigeria, from 1983 to 2001. While at IITA, he worked with several partners in the national agricultural research systems and other IITA scientists to develop soybean varieties with promiscuous nodulation, high grain and fodder yields, good resistance to pod shattering and several diseases. Some of these varieties were tested and released in several African countries and are now grown by smallholder farmers. He was the Leader of the Grain Legume Improvement Program at IITA for many years and managed soybean and cowpea projects in several African countries. Before leaving IITA in 2001, he was the Director of the Crop Improvement Division.
Before joining IITA in 2012, he was the Leader of the N2Africa Project based with CIAT-Tropical Soil Biology and Fertility in Nairobi, Kenya. This project is working with partners in eight African countries to increase grain legumes’ productivity and nitrogen fixation. He was the Location Coordinator and Research Leader for the North Central Agricultural Research Laboratory at the USDA-ARS in Brookings, South Dakota, for six years and the groundnut breeder at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater for three years.
At present his biggest interests include moving technologies that increase crop yields in farmers’ fields and improving the health and nutrition of African families from the labs and research fields to the end users, and building the capacity of the next generation of agricultural scientists, technicians, extension agents, and farmers. He is always looking for new partners for IITA in the areas of agriculture, food, nutrition, and health.
Hilde Koper-Limbourg
Hilde Koper-Limbourg is the Deputy Director General, Corporate Services of the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). Hilde is from the Netherlands and obtained a BSc in Tropical Agriculture from the International Agricultural College, Deventer, The Netherlands, in 1987 and an MSc in Human Resource Development from the University of Stirling, Scotland, in 2000.
She started work in the tropics for the West African Dwarf Goat Project, a research project of the University of Wageningen at the Obafemi Awolowo University in Ile-Ife, Nigeria. After that she worked for the Netherlands Government in a Livestock Development Project in Mongu, Zambia, and for FAO in the Caribbean Amblyomma Programme, based in St. Kitts and Barbados. After her MSc she worked as a project officer for the Lancashire – Gulu Link in the UK, a community-based charity that exists to promote mutually beneficial links between the people of Lancashire (UK) and Gulu (Northern Uganda), before coming back to Nigeria.
Back in Nigeria in 2006, she started working as a short-term consultant in IITA and the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) projects in livestock production. Between 2008 and 2016 she worked for the ‘Contract and Grants/ Project Administration’ IITA team, from starting as a consultant, to leading the team from 2011. She was hired in her current position as DDG-CS from October 2016.
Oluyemisi Iranloye
Oluyemisi Iranloye is an indigene of Ogbomosho in Oyo State, Nigeria. She obtained a B.Tech degree in Biochemistry from the Federal University of Technology, Minna in 1997 and M.Sc. in Biochemistry from the University Ibadan in 2000.
She is a graduate of Stanford Seed Transformation Programme, Stanford University, California, USA, a programme which gives her the opportunity to mentor one intern from Stanford University from year 2015 to date.
She was a member of the Governing Council of Oyo State College of Agriculture, Igboora in 2019 and currently a member of Board of Directors of IITA-Business Incubation Platform (IITA-BIP) amongst other Board appointments.
She has attended several management training courses in Nigeria and abroad, including the Nigerian SME Equity Investment Trade and Development in 2005, at El Camino College, Torrence, California USA.
Oluyemisi Iranloye is an intelligent and a visionary leader whose driving force is love for humanity.
She joined EKHA AGRO Farms Limited in 2002 as a Senior Manager, Projects and was made the pioneering Executive Director of EKHA Agro Processing Limited (the first company in West Africa and second in Africa to produce glucose syrup from cassava) in 2004.
Oluyemisi Iranloye, a born quintessential Biochemist/entrepreneur, is the first female Cassava Starch industrialist in Nigeria and West Africa; she runs an inclusive business model where smallholder farmers are at the centre stage of her business. She is a philanthropist with a large heart for helping the poor and downtrodden.
Ogechi Adeola
Professor Ogechi Adeola is a distinguished academic and global thought leader with over 20 years of experience in Strategic Marketing, Agribusiness Marketing, Entrepreneurship, Digital Innovation, and Gender Studies. She currently serves as the Deputy Vice-Chancellor at the University of Kigali, Rwanda, and as an Adjunct Professor at Torrens University Australia. Formerly a Professor of Marketing at Lagos Business School, Pan-Atlantic University, she has been recognized as the No. 1 Marketing scholar in Nigeria and among the top six in Africa by the Alper-Doger (AD) Scientific Index (2025), and is listed among Nigeria’s top 100 authors by SciVal for research output from 2020–2023. Her scholarly contributions have garnered international acclaim, including the Emerald Literati Award for Outstanding Paper and recognition among the 50 Most Influential Global Hospitality and Travel Educators.
Beyond academia, Professor Adeola plays significant leadership roles in both corporate and development sectors. She is an Independent Non-Executive Director at Cornerstone Insurance Plc, serves on the Business Administration Advisory Board at the University of the People (USA), and consults for institutions like Afreximbank and the Nigerian-British Chamber of Commerce. In 2022, she served as a National Consultant to the International Labour Organization on a project focused on women’s economic empowerment in Nigeria. Through her work, she continues to influence corporate strategy, public policy, and inclusive development across Africa.
Ayoola Francis Popoola
Mr. Ayoola Francis Popoola is an accomplished finance and accounting professional with over 32 years of industry experience spanning audit, taxation, manufacturing, and logistics. A distinguished academic, Mr. Popoola graduated with distinction from The Polytechnic, Ibadan, earned a First Class from Southwestern University, and holds an MBA in Staff Motivation and Change Management from Olabisi Onabanjo University. He further obtained an MSc in Finance from Afe Babalola University and is currently concluding his PhD in Finance. A Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (FCA), he is also a Certified Financial Consultant and a member of the Institute of Financial Consultancy.
Mr. Popoola has held key roles in organizations such as KPMG, Michelin Nigeria, and UPS, and has also consulted for McCoy Logistics. At the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Mr. Popoola initially served as Project Finance Manager and currently holds the position of Financial Controller, overseeing internal controls, institutional audit, budgetary compliance, and financial reporting for over 200 research projects. Known for his innovative and entrepreneurial spirit, he is highly skilled in financial systems, including Microsoft Excel, Oracle EBS, and Sun Accounting, with a strong emphasis on leadership, people management, and strategic financial planning.
