David Yinil will lead our in-country partner team. David is a senior cocoa agronomist and executive manager for research extension and development services (REDs) team at the Cocoa Board. David was instrumental in the introduction of cocoa into the highlands of PNG as a complementary tree crop to farmers. David was also instrumental in leading cocoa nutritional studies in several ACIAR projects including SMCN/2006/031 and SMCN/2014/048. He has extensive experience in the testing of the first release of CCIL developed hybrid clones under small holder growing conditions in PNG. He has wide experience in cocoa rehabilitation, cocoa yield decline and rejuvenation studies.
He has played a significant leadership role in the successful implementation, in-country management, and continued progress of Phase 1 of this project and will continue to be the in-country lead for this Phase 2.