The Regional Representative for West Africa at African Agricultural Technology Foundation AATF and Project Manager of the Pod Borer-Resistant (PBR) Cowpea initiative, Dr. Jean Baptiste Tignegre, has been named one of the recipients of the 2025 Top Agri-Food Pioneer (TAP) award by the World Food Prize Foundation.
The TAP award, introduced as part of the Foundation’s 39th anniversary, recognizes 39 outstanding individuals from 27 countries who are driving agricultural innovation and transforming global food systems.
Dr. Tignegre and fellow honorees will be celebrated at the prestigious Borlaug Dialogue in Des Moines, Iowa, in October 2025.
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A globally respected plant breeder with over 30 years of experience in legume and vegetable improvement, Dr. Tignegre has made significant contributions to agricultural development across West Africa.
He previously served as Principal Investigator for the Burkina Faso component of the PBR Cowpea Project before assuming full leadership of the initiative at AATF in 2023.
Under his guidance, the PBR Cowpea project has delivered high-yielding, pest-resistant cowpea varieties that reduce losses and improve livelihoods for farmers in Nigeria, Ghana, and Burkina Faso. First released in Nigeria in 2019, the PBR Cowpea became the country’s first genetically modified food crop.
In 2024, Dr. Tignegre played a central role in the introduction of PBR Cowpea to Ghana, marking it the nation’s first-ever GM crop release, and helped steer Burkina Faso through the regulatory process for environmental approval.
While congratulating him, the Director of Product Development and Commercialization at AATF, Dr. Emmanuel Okogbenin, said: “This honor is the culmination of your many years of dedicated service to farmers and the advancement of agriculture in Burkina Faso and across Africa.”
Dr. Okogbenin added that since Dr. Tignegre joined AATF, he has achieved significant milestones on the PBR Cowpea project, notably the release of the product in Ghana and the development of the next generation of products, including PBR CowpeaXtra—a second-generation variety that offers greater durability and enhanced resistance to the pod borer Maruca.
Dr. Tignegre developed low-cost off-soil vegetable gardening methods and enhanced seed systems and breeding programs across West, Central, and Southern Africa and secured and managed competitive grants from USAID, AGRA, and the Generation Challenge Program (funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation).