Before starting his own consulting company in 2007 (Radio for Peace Building Ltd) Francis was Director of Radio for Search for Common Ground (SFCG), the Washington DC based conflict transformation non-profit. He is currently Deputy Project Director for a SW and FM radio (Dandal Kura Radio International) broadcasting across the Lake Chad Basin, designed to help counter Boko Haram. From 1999-2002 he was director of SFCG’s radio production studio in Burundi – Studio Ijambo – which produced programmes designed to mitigate the conflict. Francis trains, advises, manages and mentors radio and TV media projects in countries in conflict, ranging from live discussion and current affairs programmes to soap operas. He has expertise in countering violent extremism, and conflict mitigation, and has worked on projects all over the world, from Nigeria to Papua New Guinea, and Pakistan to Sri Lanka. He has trained and mentored thirteen radio & TV soap opera teams (150 individuals) from 10 countries (Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Ukraine, DRC, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Nepal), as well as two hundred and seventy talk show hosts from 70 different radio and TV stations. Starting as a South Asia analyst with the BBC World Service, he has been in the media for more than thirty years, a journalist, producer, presenter and radio manager both in Europe and in Africa. He has given guest lectures at SOAS, the Institute of Education, l’Ecole Nationale d’Administration, and the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, and he has written extensively about media and peacebuilding: publications are listed at: http://www.radioforpeacebuilding.co.uk/#!publications/cwzt.