Team

Keith Palmer, Executive Chairman is the Executive Chairman and principal sponsor of AgDevCo. He is also the 'intellectual architect' and Chairman of InfraCo, an infrastructure project development company with a successful track-record of operating in Africa. Keith previously held the position of Vice Chairman of Rothschild, the international investment bank. He was founder Chairman of the Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund, an African debt fund, and a board member of Guarantco, an infrastructure loan guarantee facility. Keith is founder and Chairman of CEPA, a consulting company that is active in agricultural development in Africa. He has previously worked for the World Bank and IMF and in senior positions in the public sector in Tanzania and Papua New Guinea. Keith holds an honorary
professorship at the University of Dundee Centre for Energy, Petroleum and Mineral Law and Policy.

Valentine Chitalu, Non-Executive Director is an entrepreneur in Southern Africa specialising in private equity and local private sector development. Until December 2003, Valentine worked for CDC/ Actis in London and Lusaka specialising in deal origination throughout Southern Africa and portfolio management in Zambia and Malawi. Valentine was previously Chief Executive Officer at the Zambia Privatisation Agency. Valentine holds several board positions in Zambia, Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom and is Chairman of Zambian Breweries, MTN (Zambia) Limited and ALBIDON (Zambia) Limited. Valentine continues to be at the forefront of promoting both local and foreign investment into Africa and has a portfolio of investments in the financial, mining and agriculture sectors. Valentine is a UK qualified Accountant and holds a Masters Degree in Development Economics from Cambridge University in the United Kingdom.

Han Derksen, Executive Director (Development) has primary responsibility for the development and implementation of AgDevCo’s portfolio of farming and agribusiness investments. He is an experienced financial specialist having spent almost 31 years in the fields of corporate, project finance and advisory and in development finance in developing countries. Han has, for the past four years focussed on projects in the agricultural sectors of Zambia, Mozambique and Tanzania. In particular this has consisted of designing sustainable links between commercial and small holder farming focussing on programmes in wheat, soya, maize and sugar. Han was project leader for InfraCo’s Chiansi project, an innovative irrigation and commercial farming project aimed directly at benefitting smallholder farmers in Zambia, a project which now forms the basis of a nationally oriented World Bank program on which Han is advising. Han was also a senior member of a team of consultants that identified an investment pipeline for AgDevCo in Southern Africa as well as in the Beira Corridor and the Southern Tanzania Corridor, both of which presented at the World Economic Forum earlier this year. Earlier in his career Han was Managing Director and head of European Project Finance & Infrastructure for CIT in London. He has an MBA from the University of Chicago.

Chris Isaac, Director Business Development is an agriculture and infrastructure project development specialist with experience working in the public and private sectors in the UK and emerging markets, with a particular focus on Africa. He has managed agribusiness assignments and investments Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, Kenya, Rwanda and Ghana. He is leading international efforts to promote agricultural growth corridors in Tanzania and Mozambique. Before joining AgDevCo, Chris worked as Corporate Executive for InfraCo, an infrastructure project development company; as an Economic Adviser for the UK bilateral aid agency, DfID; and as a Senior Economist in the Namibian Ministry of Finance. Chris started his career as a corporate finance specialist with Arthur Andersen (he was awarded an Arthur Andersen Scholarship before university). He has economics degrees from University College, Oxford (BA Hons) and the London School of Economics (MSc); as well as an advanced qualification in Investment Appraisal.

Peter McSporran, Executive Director (Agriculture) is a farmer and qualified financial advisor in the Zambian agribusiness market, following a long career in Southern African agriculture. Having performed the initial feasibility study for the Chiansi Irrigation Project in Zambia, Peter and AAI are now managing the project and actively involved in the implementation of the expansion of the project. Having founded AAI in 2002, Peter is the immediate past Chairman of the Zambian Agricultural Commodity Exchange (ZAMACE), which he helped to establish, and the Vice-Chairman of the Biofuels Association of Zambia (BAZ). Peter initiated the relocation of displaced commercial farmers from Zimbabwe, with the consent of the Zambian Government, to Zambia. Partly due to this Zambia is now a net exporter of crops such as maize, soya and wheat. Peter has recently been part of the teams conducting a strategic review of the agricultural potential of both the Beira Corridor and the Southern Tanzanian Agricultural Growth Corridor. He is also a consultant to Barclays Bank Zambia, ZANACO and Stanbic Bank. Peter, who spent 28 years as a successful farmer, has undertaken numerous due diligences and project feasibility studies and was a major figure in the agricultural market liberalisation in Zimbabwe, having been President of the Commercial Farmers Union. For many years he was a board member of Seed Co and the Tanganda Tea Co and is presently a director of Afgri Corporation (Z). He was also instrumental in the formation of ZIMACE, the Zimbabwean Commodity Exchange, and became its first Chairman. Peter is presently working closely with members of the Zambian Government to promote investment.
Shuba

Daniel Hulls, Senior Advisor, is a specialist in finance, economics, and public policy and development. He is a founding Director of Cambridge Economic Policy Associate (CEPA) and until recently was Managing Director. Prior to joining CEPA, Daniel worked for N M Rothschild and HM-Treasury. He has extensive experience of the development and delivery of PPPs in Europe; corporate and regulatory finance; and economic evaluation and appraisal - including of development programmes.  He has wide range of sector experience including in agriculture, health, telecoms, transport and housing. At CEPA Daniel has lead worked across these sectors with a focus in Europe on regulatory finance and advising clients on major PFI (project finance) transactions. His work in emerging markets has been on agriculture, with clients including the Rockefeller and Gates Foundations, AGRA and DFID; and more recently in global health – with clients including GAVI, WHO and UNITAID.

Shuba Chandran, Senior Advisor is a business and social entrepreneur who owns and manages the largest privately-owned tea plantations business in India, with diversified interests in insurance services and real estate. She has 15 years of experience in restructuring and managing unviable medium and large agri-businesses, turning them to profit and establishing local markets for large volumes of production. She has implemented a number of pioneering women empowerment programs for employees, including micro-finance and skill enhancement schemes. Shuba is also an active member of two regional biodiversity councils and has launched an eco-tourism venture. Early in her career, she worked in the renewable energy and manufacturing sectors. She has a BSc Economics (Hons) from the London School of Economics (LSE), an LL.B. (Hons) degree and is a member of the Bar Council of India. Shuba was awarded the Yale World Fellowship in 2010.

Yasser Toor, Senior Advisor previously spent over ten years as an investment banker and private equity principal in the United States, most recently as a General Partner and Managing Director of TSG Consumer Partners, a private equity partnership with over $1.5 billion of funds under management. At TSG, Yasser's role involved proactively originating new investment opportunities; negotiating, structuring and executing transactions; and leading business and marketing strategy for portfolio companies. During his tenure, TSG grew funds under management 9x due to its top tier investment returns driven by the strong performance of associated portfolio businesses. More recently, Yasser led the private sector development team in Sierra Leone for the Tony Blair Africa Governance Initiative, advising the Office of the President on infrastructure and agribusiness investment strategy. Yasser has a Bachelor of Arts from Dartmouth College, with a double major in economics and computer science.

Lauren Ryder, Corporate Executive is a specialist in impact investing with a background in development and commercial fund management, management consulting and civil and environmental engineering.  Prior, Lauren was the Investment Manager for Ariya Capital, a fund manager focused on sustainable investments in clean energy in Sub-Saharan Africa.  Lauren previously worked for Roberts Enterprise Development Fund (REDF), which invests in small-to-medium socialenterprises in low-income communities; Marakon Associates, a boutique strategy management company; Whiting-Turner, a construction company; and was a business advisor to the emerging markets venture fund Dev Equity.  She is a founder and Director of the Equilibrium Partnership and holds a BEng (Distinction) from Duke University and a MBA (Distinction) from Oxford University’s Said Business School.

Rosanne Whalley, Portfolio Manager completed an MSc in International Development from the London School of Economics (LSE). Rosanne concentrated her studies on value chain upgrading in the agricultural sector, with a specific focus on small-scale coffee producers. Her previous work experience includes working as a project manager organising financial services conferences for the rotating EU Presidency in Brussels, Gothenburg and Nice. She has also worked as an intern for International Crisis Group, an independent, non-profit organisation committed to preventing and resolving deadly conflict. Rosanne has a BA in Politics, Philosophy and Economics from the University of York.

Antoinette O’Brien, Managing Accountant joined AgDevCo in February 2011 as the in house accountant. She is responsible for the financial administration and reporting for the company. Antoinette qualified in 1992 and spent her early career in SME’s in the creative sector. She has expertise in company management and business start-ups. She then went on to join an accountancy practice in Ireland as an associate and assisted a wide variety of clients in business planning, structure and compliance. She returned to live in London in 2009. Since then she has been working at the International Hydropower Association and works for Infraco on a part time basis as their Management Accountant.

Hanna Hagos, Portfolio and Research Assistant, joined in July 2011. She completed an MSc in Political Economy of Late Development from the London School of Economics (LSE). She previously interned as a Researcher at the Africa Research Institute, a think-tank based in Westminster; that aims to highlight ideas which have worked in Africa and identify local achievements. Her principal contribution was assisting a DFID consultant with a counterpoint; (‘Talking Gender in Africa’) a critical analysis of gender development programmes in Africa. Hanna has a L.L.B (Hons) from Brunel University.