Ruben G. Echeverria

Prior to joining the Foundation in October 2021 Ruben has worked on international food, agriculture, and rural development issues - with emphasis on agricultural innovation – for more than 30 years. 

Ruben is Director General Emeritus of the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT-CGIAR) based in Cali, Colombia. He led CIAT from 2009 to 2019 expanding operations into Africa and Asia 
and in 2019 promoted the creation of the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT. During 2020-2021 Ruben was Chair of the Global Commission on Sustainable Agricultural Intensification 
(COSAI) and Sr. Advisor on Agricultural and Rural Innovation to the FAO Latin America and the Caribbean regional office; and a Sr. Research Fellow at the International Food Policy Research 
Institute (IFPRI-CGIAR) based in Washington DC. 

In the mid-2000s Ruben was Executive Director of the Science Council of the CGIAR based at FAO Rome. Before that he worked in agricultural, environmental and rural development transformation 
for more than a decade at the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington, DC where he prepared several multi-million-dollar projects and led the creation of the Inter-Agency Group for Rural Development and the Regional Fund for Agricultural Technology (FONTAGRO). 

In the late 1980s he worked on agricultural research policy issues and strengthening national research capacities in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, based at the International Service for National Agricultural Research (ISNAR-CGIAR) in The Hague, Netherlands. As part of his Ph.D. thesis, he conducted field research based at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT-CGIAR) in Mexico. 

Ruben studied Agronomy at the University of Uruguay (B.Sc.) and Agriculture Economics at the University of Minnesota, USA (M.Sc. and Ph.D.) with special emphasis on the economics of technical and institutional change. He has received numerous international awards and has had leadership management training at Harvard, USA and IMD, Switzerland and belongs to several professional associations. Among other activities he was a Member of the High-Level Panel of 
Experts on Food Security and Nutrition of the Committee of Food Security (2021-2025), a member of Scientific Advisory Board of the UNFSS Hub (2023-2024) and Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Catalan Institute of Agrifood Research and Technology (IRTA) during 2018-24.