He has a Bachelor's degree in Botany from the University of Port Harcourt and a Ph.D. in Weed-Crop Ecology from the University of Ibadan. Professor Udensi has spent his adult life training and working with farmers on the management and improvement of agricultural output. This is both a personal passion and a professional mission. He has led several national and international development projects aimed at agricultural value chain enhancement across a number of crop verticals. He has been the lead implementation scientist on a number of crop science and value chain development projects including the Efficacy Trial of Lagon 575SC & Laudis 630 SC (Bayer Crop Science, A.G.); FGN-Cassava Transformation Agenda (CGIAR/IITA, USAID, Shell, Federal Government of Nigeria); West Africa Agricultural Productivity Programme (WAAPP) (Nigeria Assisted Value Chain Innovation Platforms); IITA-Bill & Melinda Gate Foundation Cassava Weed Project (CGIAR/IITA, Gates Foundation); Weed Management/Best Agronomic Practices to Diamond Initiative (DDI)’s SHARE (Support to Vulnerable Households for Accelerated Revenue Earnings); IITA-IFAD High Quality Cassava Flour (HQCF) Project Survey, amongst others.
In addition to his field-based practice expertise, he has tremendous research and development experience. His areas of expertise include commercial agriculture and commodity value chain development; agricultural research & technology development; weed-crop ecology and aquatic weed management (with a specialty for flora in the Niger Delta); profitability of chemical and other weed management strategies for control of troublesome grass weeds (including Panicum maximum, Rottboellia cochinchinensis, Imperata cylindrical and aquatic weeds).
He has done extensive work on the development of compatible chemical weed control in arable crop-intercrops in Southern Nigeria (Southeast and South-South) with leguminous cover crops, non-chemical weed management with forage and edible legume cycle and intercrop, promotion of local legumes and maize intercrop in small farm holdings for weed management and soil amendment, and screen house bioassay of recent herbicide chemistries to determine the economic injury level and tolerance/susceptibility of major arable crops and weeds.
With over sixty publications and major presentations to his credit, alongside hundreds of undergraduate and graduate students who have benefited from his experience and expertise, Professor Udensi personifies the academic, tactile and developmental ethos that underpins technical entrepreneurship. He lives in Port Harcourt (when he is not marching through farms in remote villages documenting and motivating farm productivity).