William Dar

William Dar is a Filipino horticulturist and civil servant who served as Director General of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, ICRISAT, from 1999 to 2014, a fifteen year tenure during which he directed the CGIAR center's global research program on sorghum, millet, chickpea, pigeonpea and groundnut for farmers across the semi-arid tropics of Asia and Africa. Born in 1953 in Santa Maria, Ilocos Sur, and trained in horticulture through a doctorate from the University of the Philippines Los Banos, he built his early career in Philippine agricultural research, becoming the first director of the country's Bureau of Agricultural Research after its founding in 1988 and later executive director of the Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development. After his ICRISAT tenure he returned to Philippine public service as the country's Secretary of Agriculture from August 2019 to June 2022 under President Rodrigo Duterte, having also briefly held the post in an acting capacity in 1998 and 1999, and he served on the governing boards of IRRI and CIMMYT alongside his own institute's board.