Dr. Sylvester Dickson Baguma Appointed Interim ASARECA Executive Director

By Ben Moses Ilakut

ENTEBBE, UGANDA—The ASARECA Board of Directors have appointed Dr. Sylvester Dickson Baguma as Interim Executive Director of the Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in Eastern and Central Africa (ASARECA). The appointment takes immediate effect starting from October 7, 2024.

Dr. Baguma is currently the Director of the National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO) Bulindi Zonal Agricultural Research and Development Institute (BuZARDI) in western Uganda. He is also a member of NARO Governing Council, the highest Governance body of the National Organization, as well as acting Chair of the NARO Intellectual Property Management Committee, which promotes commercialization of NARO’s agricultural research technologies and innovations. He is on several boards of different entities in Uganda.

Dr. Sylvester Baguma, Interim Executive Director, ASARECA 

According to the Board Communication, Dr. Baguma has urgent tasks to accomplish, top on the list is supporting the Board of Directors as they embark on the process of recruiting a substantive Executive Director for the Association; seeking and leveraging on existing partnerships with complementary Agricultural Research for Development institutions and development partners to crowd in opportunities and resources for ASARECA; and act in the best interest of Member States.

Dr. Baguma is widely exposed in both local and international spheres having conducted several consultancies and monitoring and evaluation assignments within and outside Africa, Europe and the Caribbean, including working with Centre for Development Innovation (CDI), the Netherlands, CTA, FAO on accelerated technology uptake, IFPRI, and several NGOs and CBOs. He has wide practical experience in facilitating multi-stakeholder engagements.

He is not new to ASARECA. Over the last 20 years, he has participated in core teams during consultations to inform priorities and drafting of ASARECA’s Strategic, Medium-Term Operational, and Programmatic Plans which have informed ASARECA’s strategic focus and impacts over the decades. He was part of the team that designed the ASARECA Master’s course in AICKM which is being implemented by universities in some member countries.

A public speaker and facilitator, he has moderated ASARECA’s strategic and flagship stakeholder engagement events and discourse including the ASARECA Agriculture Ministerial Conference (2023), the Regional Common Ground Dialogue for Mainstreaming Sustainable Agriculture in Eastern and Southern Africa (2024), and the consultative meeting for CGIAR and the National Agricultural Research Systems for Easten and Southern Africa.

At Continental level, Dr. Baguma was part of the lead team of experts from the National Agricultural Research Systems that worked with the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) and ASARECA to develop priorities for the Regional Agricultural Information Network (RAIN) for the ASARECA sub-region, and the ERAILS programme, an information system through which farming communities and farmer advisory service providers are mobilized to generate questions for agricultural experts to provide actionable responses including speedy information to farmers.

Dr. Baguma holds a PhD in Knowledge Management of Loughborough University in the UK, a master’s degree in ICT specializing in MIS of Cranifield Univeristy in the UK, a master’s in agriculture of Makerere University, a postgraduate diploma in Modern Management and Administration of Cambridge Tutorial College and has formal training in project planning and management including using outcome mapping for planning and M&E. He has proven experience in designing and implementing strategic plans for impact.

He has been guiding and supervising processes of packaging and disseminating agricultural research information and technologies for target user clients in addition to publishing new agricultural research knowledge.

He comes as an immediate replacement of Dr. Enock Warinda, whose services the Board of Directors terminated on September 30, 2024.  Related Board Statement