Mr. Akankiza Samson Mpiira has been named the Director Technical Services who will be deputizing the newly appointed executive director of Dairy Development Authority (DDA) Dr. Michael Kansiime, replacing Dr. Jolly Zaribwende whose contract expired.
DDA is an autonomous government agency under the agriculture, animal industry and fisheries ministry that is charged with advising government on policies that can help development, promotion and regulation of the dairy industry.
Mr. Mpiira works with the Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) as Coffee Sustainability Manager and also a National Programme Coordinator for the Euro 35 million EAC Market Access Upgrade (MARKUP) initiative funded by the EU as part of the 11th European Development Fund. It is a four year Programme implemented by 5 EAC partner states with overall supervision of the EAC Secretariat.
He has more than 14 years’ experience in design and management of projects and programmes, business development, export marketing, proposal writing, promotions, extensive experience in coordinating research activities and policy-level analysis, market research, monitoring and evaluation, value chains analysis and development, high level collaboration and networking, strong communication, analytical and writing skills.
He received his first degree in Food Science and Technology from Makerere University, later I obtained a post graduate diploma in Project Planning and Management from Uganda Management Institute, a Master of Business Administration in International Business from Amity University Uttar Pradesh- India and a Master of Science in Applied Human Nutrition Makerere University. Previously he attained a National Diploma in Dairy Science and Technology from Bukalasa Agricultural College. He is an accomplished International Business Expert, Project Management Specialist, Food Science and Technologist with both private and public service experience.
He is not new to the Uganda dairy sector as he started his career in early 2000s at Dairy Corporation Limited at Dairy Manager for Milk collection centers in Bushenyi, Sheema, Ntungano and Mbarara districts responsible for the management of all the quality assurance activities, quality control and monitoring activities of milk in the field. He joined Uganda Industrial Research Institute (UIRI) as a Research Technician – Dairy Technology Department and later joined Techno Serve Inc/ East African Dairy Development Project (EADD) as Project Senior Business Advisor – Dairy Producer Business Organizations.
He has a strong fund raising skill/ proposal writing and has undertaken various consultancy/ research projects. He undertook pre – scoping (Initial Analysis and Dialogue) and full scoping- facilitating multi-stakeholder consultations and provision of analytical inputs to the further design of a Uganda cooperation program between the Government of the Republic of Uganda and the Global Green Growth Institute. He is a Uganda Country Representative of the Africa Circular Economy Network (ACEN).
Mr. Mpiira was very instrumental in the formulation of the coffee 2020 roadmap which was born out of H.E. the President directive to accelerate coffee production from 3 million to 20 million bags by 2025 that he launched on 13th April 2017 consisting of 9 initiatives to catalyze the transformation of coffee sector. UCDA is losing staff to DDA who has developed systems, programs and guidelines for the development of sustainable, specialty and fine coffee niches in the coffee sub-sector.
