Our mentor

Dr Nwanze was a Senior Scientist at ICRISAT where he played a pivotal role in improving the livelihoods of farmers in the semi-arid tropics. Both Vijay and Sadhana worked on publications for him, and he knew their competence. In 1998, Dr. Nwanze became the Director General of the West Africa Rice Development Organization (WARDA). He wanted the BluePencil team to join him there but because of personal reasons, we could not go. Dr Nwanze then gave us our first remote turnkey job — we had to edit, design, and print a slim report titled Looking back into the future, and deliver the books in Côte d’Ivoire — tasks not as easy then as they are now. This little book paved the way for many more assignments from various organizations in West and East Africa.

We will forever be grateful to Dr Kanayo Nwanze for this gesture.