Center Directors General

William Dar took the helm at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) in January 2000. He has a long and distinguished career as an educationalist, agricultural scientist, administrator, and humanitarian in his native Philippines and internationally, specifically in the Asia-Pacific region and sub-Saharan Africa.

William chaired the Committee on Science and Technology of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification from 2007 to 2009, and has also been a member of the UN Millennium Task Force on Hunger. He served as vice president at Benguet State University and director of the Bureau of Agricultural Research, Philippines Department of Agriculture. In 1994, he became executive director of the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Forestry, and Natural Resources Research and Development, and in 1998, he was appointed Secretary of the Department of Agriculture. In 1999, he was appointed Presidential Advisor on Rural Development in the Philippines, where he turned around national food production. He served in this capacity until joining ICRISAT.

William has BSc and MSc degrees in agricultural education and agronomy from Benguet State University, and a PhD in horticulture from the University of the Philippines, Los Banos.