Dr Simon Hearn is ACIAR’s Principal Adviser. He is responsible for a variety of strategic planning and budgeting activities, including identifying strategic directions and providing high-level oversight for ACIAR's research and development program. Dr Hearn also acts as a senior point of contact for ACIAR inter-departmental and government relations activities.

Michele Pietrowski has more than 12 years of international communications experience, most of which has been spent promoting agricultural research for development for the CGIAR. Currently, Michele manages communications for the CGIAR Fund Office. Previously, she was Senior Communications Specialist at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). Prior to joining the CGIAR, Michele was Information Officer for the Ethiopian Government Spokesperson’s Office in Addis Ababa and Public Affairs Officer at the Ethiopian Embassy in Washington, D.C.

working as a professor at the university federal do paraná [www.litoral.ufpr.br] in the tematic as cognitive approach of in-farm decisions of production. Cognitive approach of in-farm decisions of production and the relationships beetwen farmers' representations, the way they collect and process informations, and the way they conceive and take a série of decisions.

Dr Berg has a background in natural resource management. He coordinates research internationalisation with Aarhus University's food and agriculture departments, in relation to Africa and emerging economies. Represents the university in Agrinatura (board member), European Forum on Agriculture and Rural Development (EFARD) and in relation to DANIDA and Universities Denmark initiatives such as Building Stronger Universities (BSU) in Development Countries programme, as well as in relation to other interest groups.

I am currently an astute youth here in Nigeria,a social entreprenuer I have volunteered for several NGOs on youth capacity development and currently have a proposal on bringing youth involvement in Agriculture which I would be presenting in Rhodes youth forum 2012.