Miller remembered for international development

G. David Miller, founder and director of the UC Davis Global Fellowships in Agricultural Development program and a collaborator in the Horticulture Innovation Lab, died Dec. 1, 2022, in Davis. A memorial service was held Dec. 4 at Congregation Bet Haverim in Davis.

Miller was a lecturer within the international agricultural development track in the Department of Plant Sciences, and faculty adviser in the IAD Graduate Group. “For many years, he was the heart of the IAD programs, teaching, hunting up fellowship and scholarship money, and more,” said Amanda Crump.

Miller earned a master's degree in community economic development from the University of Michigan, a master's of science in educational psychology from Northeastern University, and a bachelor's degree in psychology from Brown University.

For more than 50 years, Miller’s work focused on international community economic development. He spent 12 of those years living and working in the Middle East and North Africa. In the 1970s with the Peace Corps, Miller volunteered in Morocco, and directed programs in Afghanistan and Tunisia. While working for the United States Agency for International Development, he managed a multi-million dollar program supporting the activity of non-government organizations throughout the Middle East. As a part of that, in 1982 in Lebanon, he designed and implemented the first micro-credit program funded by USAID. After leaving government, he was deputy vice president of programs for Save the Children.

At UC Davis, Miller started the Research Innovations Fellowship in Agriculture program, later renamed Global Fellowships in Agricultural Development. He recruited, trained and placed graduate-level scholars from throughout the University of California system to design and implement sustainable development projects. With the Horticulture Innovation Lab, he collaborated on projects in Cambodia and Vietnam, including the design and implementation of shared-interest savings groups among small farmers to encourage sustainable farming enterprises. He also worked on projects in East Africa.

Miller took a program created by students and faculty of UC Davis to Palestine and southern Lebanon. There, youth were trained to create murals expressing a vision for their future on the external walls of schools and government buildings.

Miller was also a professor emeritus at Southern New Hampshire University, where consulted for the master’s program in international community economic development, which he had established in 1988. He was a research fellow at the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University

Commemoration being planned

Miller served on the board of several non-governmental organizations and educational institutions, including on the editorial board of the Point Reyes Light newspaper and on the tenure review committee of the American University of Beirut, and he consulted with the American University of Armenia.

Besides English, Miller spoke French, Hebrew and Moroccan Arabic.

When asked what inspired him, Miller responded, “My dear wife, Professor Susan Miller. She threatened to beat me up over 70 years ago when we first met at age 6, and she still continues to do so.”

A commemoration is being planned. Details will be posted here when they become available.