John "Bick" Riley

Senior Technical Director, Agribusiness Africa Portfolio

Senior Technical Director for the Agribusiness Africa portfolio John ‘Bick’ Riley is an accomplished project management and design specialist with over 18 years of experience managing field programs in Africa. Mr. Riley’s negotiation and partnering skills have enabled him to build strong institutional and working relationships with host governments, producer organizations, local civil society leaders and donor organizations. Mr. Riley has extensive experience in producer group, civil society and nongovernmental organization capacity building. In his recent chief of party (COP) position for ACDI/VOCA’s 5-year, $15 million USAID-funded Cape Verde PL 480 Title II Food Security Program, Mr. Riley oversaw the development of community-based agribusinesses for sustainable livelihood improvement. The project developed the organizational capacity of approximately 100 community associations in democratic governance, financial management, microenterprise creation and management. With Mr. Riley’s guidance, the project also helped traditional smallholder horticultural farmers adopt drip irrigation systems and provided technical and financial assistance to two nascent microfinance associations as they made progress towards financial sustainability. Prior to his work with ACDI/VOCA, Mr. Riley held various leadership positions in Benin, Zimbabwe, Guinea, Tanzania, Central African Republic, Rwanda and Chad for Africare. He earned his M.S. in international agricultural development at the University of California at Davis, a B.S. in geography and anthropology at California State Polytechnic University and a certificate in executive management at Claremont Graduate University. He also served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Togo teaching vocational agricultural. He is fluent in French and Portuguese.