NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Neil Wood is a Partner and Head of Agriculture and Food Systems Practice at Open Capital, in addition to leading the firm’s Humanitarian portfolio. With a wealth of expertise across Africa, Neil specializes in conducting extensive food system assessments, formulating institutional strategies and designing impactful agrifood market interventions, with key interests in climate smart agriculture, climate finance, gender inclusion and nutrition. Neil’s experience also includes supporting dozens of agribusinesses through dedicated programs to unlock financing into the sector.

Neil joined Open Capital from Grameen Foundation, where he developed strategies and partnership models to support smallholder farmers through capacity building, demand and supply aggregation, and access to financial services. He also brings many years of experience in due diligence, audit, valuation and advisory engagements from PwC. Neil is a Chartered Certified Accountant with an MBA (Hons) from Melbourne Business School and a B.Sc. (Hons) in Business & Economics from Wiesbaden Business School.