Stephen Collins

Chief of Party, Kenya Maize Development Project

Chief of Party (COP) for the Kenya Maize Development Project Steve Collins is an agricultural manager with over 30 years of experience working in Africa with the public and private sectors, in areas including smallholder farmers, capacity building and local empowerment. As COP for ACDI/VOCA’s Kenya Maize Development Project (KMDP), he manages the project, which involves a diverse consortium of partners within the maize value chain, including the Cereal Growers Association of Kenya, Farm Input Promotions Africa Ltd. and the Kenya Agricultural Commodity Exchange. KMDP boosts household incomes by raising productivity, improving effectiveness of smallholder organizations and increasing access to agricultural markets and business support services using a holistic value chain approach. After 4 years KMDP has reached some 250,000 farming families. Before joining ACDI/VOCA, Mr. Collins was the lead person for Monsanto’s Small Holder Business Development program, overseeing staff in 12 African countries who were working with improved seeds, crop protection chemicals and agronomic systems for conservation tillage. Mr. Collins’s diverse experience includes working with microcredit systems as well as developing output marketing plans. Prior to the smallholder role, he ran Monsanto’s sub-Saharan business, except for the Republic of South Africa, technically and commercially over many years. As former president of the Crop Life Africa/Middle East organization, he led this international crop protection association, increasing country participation from 7 to 29 chapters, and managed its annual $750,000 training budget. He has written more than 50 publications on entomology, biodiversity and conservation tillage agronomic systems. Mr. Collins earned his B.S. in zoology at the Imperial College in London and earlier studied elephant behavior at the Serengeti Research Institute in Tanzania. He is fluent in French, Swahili and English.