Alesha (Black) Miller

Leading strategy, business development, communications, and MEL. Collaborating with technologists, agro-experts and governance thought leaders to utilize artificial intelligence equitably and effectively to address the challenges facing smallholder farmers.

Proofing Station is a non-profit, impact-first investment fund focused on increasing access to capital for small and mid-sized food enterprises in the Midwest. Proofing Station offers financing and technical assistance to help entities operating across all sectors in the food system and agriculture supply chain advance ecological sustainability, social and racial equity, and economic resilience.

Continuing the work I began as Director, but also supervising new Fellows and areas of work related to humanitarian governance, water, and women, peace and security. In addition, I support the overall leadership of the Chicago Council as a member of the Senior Management team.

I direct the Council's work on food and agriculture, focused on how to achieve food and nutrition security and economic opportunity through smallholder agriculture. To do this, the Council produces world class publications on major themes in the sector, convenes compelling thinkers to discuss tough issues, and engages the next generation of agriculture and food leaders to take up the torch. With this evidence and expertise, the Council then works with civil society and the private sector to advocate and realize policy change.

I act as an advisor to BST, an early stage technology company, as they consider partnerships and scaling opportunities. BST has created AutoAnthro, which measures human body parameters using lightweight, handheld scanners. This technology allows healthcare professionals, researchers, and public health enumerators to gather anthropometric data accurately, quickly, and securely while also reducing the invasiveness of the data collection process as compared to traditional anthropometry.

In this role I led a small team working to create productive partnerships with highly aligned bilateral and multilateral partners. With these partners, we pursued close coordination and shared problem solving on a limited set of issues in order to accelerate and scale the opportunities available for smallholder farmers. In addition, we piloted new approaches to understand the existing partner landscape (public, private), and look for opportunities to push the scale and speed of supporting agricultural transformation.

Continued grant-making and management in the area of agricultural development, particularly focusing on staple grain and horticulture markets in sub-Saharan Africa. Strong emphasis on the role public sector actors play in stimulating smallholder access to markets and overall development and strengthening of agricultural marketing systems. Also provide leadership support in the areas of nutrition integration in agriculture and grantmaking to local institutions among other issues.

Supported a Senior Program Officer in the management of grants supporting increased market access for smallholder farmers through public procurement. Assisted in the development of larger grants, such as one linking school feeding programs to local farmers to increase agricultural benefits from these programs. Led the development of shorter term grants supporting links with nutrition and agriculture and supporting various conferences, while providing cross-cutting M&E guidance for the 7+ grantees in the portfolio.

Served a Senior Fellow in developing the Foundation's thinking and early policy documents around gender, M&E, and capacity building during the formation of the Agricultural Development program. Supported advocacy efforts to raise the profile of international agriculture and the important role of women among development stakeholders. Took responsibility for early grantmaking in these emerging areas (M&E, gender, advocacy).

Supported the Population, Refugees and Migration staff (State Department) based in Geneva in their interactions with the International Organization on Migration, UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), and the International Committee of the Red Cross. This involved support, coordination and attendance at annual meetings for two organizations, regular communication with the aforementioned organizations to monitor high priority issues and participation in ongoing working groups of interest.