OLOWOGBON, Toyin Samuel holds a Master’s and Ph.D. Degrees in Agricultural Economics from the University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria. He has over 15 years of professional experience in his research interest.   As a trained and distinguished agricultural economist, Olowogbon expresses his passion for agri-preneurship and agricultural value chain development. He believes that agri-preneurship is one of the fastest ways to help solve Africa’s major challenges, including hunger, poverty, and unemployment. He believed in exemplary leadership and see himself as a major stakeholder in inspiring agri-preneurs to lead the African agricultural revolution to success.

With his vision of a food-secure and prosperous Africa with a thriving agricultural sector and prosperous smallholder farmers, In the last ten years, his work has allowed him to develop agricultural innovations and reach out to smallholder farmers, youths, and women to enhance productivity, income, inclusive and sustainable agricultural sector. This he has done by promoting market-oriented development of agricultural value chain solutions. Toyin Olowogbon is a Co-founder and Agricultural Economist at the Centre for Sustainable Agricultural Empowerment (CSAE), Ilorin, Nigeria.

A non-profit organization that provides Nigerian youths, women, and farmers with agricultural empowerment skills and support for self-reliance and sufficiency (see details from www.csaempowerment.com). He is also the Co-founder of an agri-processing company (Blessmath Global Enterprises): The company produces and markets GarriVITA, a low-cost, premium quality, micronutrient-enriched, packaged and handy cassava flake fortified with Vitamin A, B1, B2, B3, B6 &B12, Iron, and Zinc processed from fresh cassava tubers and soybean mix using integrated technology.  This has reduced cassava post-harvest losses, unemployment, poverty among farmers, and micronutrient deficiency in Nigeria. Details can be found at www.blessmath.com.

He is the 2019 Winner of the Young African Innovators (West Africa) Award by RUFORUM, a 2019 Winner of the Young African Leadership Initiative (YALI) Alumni Innovative Fund (YAIF) by USAID, and a 2020 Young African Researchers in Agriculture Research Grant Awardee. 2021 Green Talent Awardee by the German Ministry of Education and Research. 2021 Winner of the Roddenberry Foundation Catalyst Grant, among others.