Ian was born in Udaipur, Rajasthan, India, where his father was a surgeon at a missionary station. He studied Botany at Edinburgh University, Scotland and earned a PhD in Plant Phisiology. He then worked with MRA for ten years, in the UK, the USA, and India, among other countries. He then went to Zimbabwe, then Rhodesia, where he accepted a position as lecturer for the University of Rhodesia. "We need to feed the country, guys" was his rallying cry. He then taught Plant Physiology and Molecular Biology at what had become the University of Zimbabwe, where he worked on the development of disiase-free and draught-resistant, high yielding varieties of traditional crops such as cassava. He trained hundreds of students in tissure culture, set up a small business, Agri-Biotech, at which he employed former students and provided high quality planting material for sweet potato, cassava, and potato to small and commercial farmers across Zimbabwe.
