Board Member Biographies

Paul Zuckerman is the Chair and CEO of Zuckerman & Associates LLC. His expertise is in Finance and Economics.  He has a BA & MA in Economics, Trinity College, Cambridge University, (1964-67) Higher National Diploma, Agricultural Economics, Trinity College, Cambridge University, (1967-68) PhD, Agricultural Economics, Reading University, (1970-74).

He retired from full time investment banking in 1998, having been Managing Director and Founding Director of Caspian Securities, Ltd (1995-98); and before that Executive Director, S G Warburg & Co Ltd, London; Vice Chair, S G Warburg International; Chair S G Warburg Latin America Ltd (1981-95).

He spent six years at the World Bank as Senior Economist, World Bank from 1974-80; and before that was Research Associate, IITA (1970-72) and Training Associate, Ford Foundation (1968-70) based at IITA.

Since 1998 he has been on the Board of a number of international companies and is now on the board of, amongst others,, ArcelorMittal Ltd Brazil, JMFinancial Ltd and TechMahindra Ltd in India; various BlackRock Hedge Funds; and Iceni Mobile, a South African owned company in the UK.

He was Chair of the Intermediate Technology Group (1990-95), Treasurer of the International Women’s Health Coalition in New York (2000-10) and on the board of The African Medical Research Foundation in Nairobi (2002-10). He is presently Treasurer of the National Art Collections Fund in the UK.

He is a Foreign Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an Honorary Fellow of King’s College London.

Cristián Samper became President and CEO of the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York in August 2012. The 117-year-old organization runs the world’s largest system of urban wildlife parks, including the renowned Bronx Zoo and New York Aquarium. In addition, WCS oversees more than 500 conservation projects in 67 countries around the world and has helped establish and manage more than 150 protected areas covering more than 200 million acres.

Dr Samper was the Director of the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC for a decade, where he was responsible for managing the largest natural history collection in the world (126 million specimens and artifacts), overseeing scientific staff that produces more than 500 research publications each year and hosting more than six million visitors annually. He also served as Acting Secretary (CEO) of the Smithsonian Institution in 2007 and 2008, overseeing the largest complex of Museums in the world.

Prior to joining the Smithsonian in 2001, he was the founder and first director of the Alexander von Humboldt Institute, the national biodiversity research institute of Colombia. He was awarded the National Medal of the Environment by the President of Colombia in 2001. He served as the Chairman of the scientific advisory body of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, and was one of the leaders of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment study published in 2005.

He has published and lectured extensively around the world on topics related to conservation biology and science policy, and is a Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences of Colombia and the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World. Dr Samper is currently a member of the Board of Overseers of Harvard University and the Carnegie Institution for Science. Born in San José, Costa Rica and raised in Colombia, Dr Samper studied biology at the Universidad de Los Andes in Bogotá and earned his master's and doctorate degrees in biology from Harvard University, where he was awarded the Derek Bok prize for excellence in teaching.

Jeremy Burdon is an evolutionary biologist with particular interests in plant-microbe interactions. His active research interests encompass problems involving pathogens of agricultural crops, using fungi as biological control agents for controlling invasive weeds and understanding the complexities of the interplay of parasitic and symbiotic interactions in natural systems. He has published around 170 scientific articles, two books and three edited volumes, and has a citation score of over 4500.

Since joining the Division of Plant Industry, CSIRO in 1978 as a Queen Elizabeth II Fellow, Dr Burdon has spent time as a Fulbright Scholar and E.C. Stakman Visiting Professor at the USDA Cereal Rust Laboratory in Minnesota, USA and as a Visiting Professor in the Department of Ecological Botany at the University of Umeå, Sweden. He was promoted to Chief of the Division of Plant Industry in 2003.

In recent years, Dr Burdon's work has been recognized through the award of an honorary Doctorate by Umeå University, Sweden (1996), election to the Fellowship of the Australian Academy of Science (1996), the American Phytopathological Society (2003), the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences (2004), and through honorary membership of the Mycological Society of America. He was awarded the Gottschalk Medal by the Australian Academy of Science in 1987 and received the EC Stakman Award from the University of Minnesota in 2003. He has served on the editorial boards of the Australian Journal of Botany (1987-1992), Euphytica (1987-1999), Ecology Letters (1999-2002), Oecologia (1990-2009) and the Journal of Ecology (2003-2009).

Christina Frankopan, of Croatian and Swedish extraction, was raised and educated in the UK. She is a Rome-based finance professional specializing in advising on corporate and financial strategy, especially in the financial services and asset management sectors. Christina began her career in investment banking within the Corporate Strategy Group at Lazard in London and has subsequently worked with the advisory boutiques Soditic and Auden Capital, for whom she continues to consult.

Strategic and transaction advisory services have included cross-border multi-jurisdictional work, due diligence management and the design of complex incentive structures and are currently focused on the Italian, Swiss and UK markets. She is also the co-founder of static trade exhibition and textile design companies.

She is a member of the Finance and Audit Task Group with Bioversity International and takes an active interest in issues of financial and risk management.

She read Economics as a Choral Scholar at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge (MA) and is a Member of the Chartered Institute of Securities & Investments and a Fellow of the RSA.

Emile Frison has been the Director General of Bioversity International (formerly IPGRI – International Plant Genetic Resources Institute) since 1 August 2003. In that role, he increased the emphasis of the Center’s work on the use of agricultural biodiversity to improve the lives of smallholder farmers in developing countries by diversifying their livelihoods and improving their nutrition and the sustainability of their production systems.

Emile Frison has spent most of his career in international agricultural research, including 18 years on work related to plant genetic resources. He obtained an MSc in plant pathology from the Catholic University of Louvain and a PhD from the University of Gembloux in Belgium.

Dr Frison commenced his career in international agricultural research at the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA) in Nigeria in 1979. He worked in Africa for six years (Nigeria and Mauritania) and subsequently became Development Manager of an agrochemical company in Belgium for three years. He joined Bioversity International in 1987 to coordinate research on plant health aspects in plant collections. In 1992, as Regional Director for Europe, he initiated a new phase of the European Cooperative Programme for Crop Genetic Resources Networks. He also launched the European Forest Genetic Resources Programme in collaboration with FAO.

As Director of Bioversity's International Network for the Improvement of Banana and Plantain (INIBAP), Dr Frison gave added impetus to research on this neglected crop, the tropical world's fourth most important staple food. In 1997, he launched the Global Programme for Musa Improvement (PROMUSA), which brought together researchers and growers with an interest in bananas and plantains. In 2002 he launched the Global Consortium on Musa Genomics with 27 members from 14 countries.

From 2003 to 2011, Dr Frison has led the System-wide Genetic Resources Programme (SGRP) of the CGIAR. In January 2004 he took on the role of Secretary for the CGIAR's Genetic Resources Policy Committee (GRPC). He has been a Member of the Executive Board of Ecoagriculture Partners, Washington DC since 2006. In December of the same year he joined the Comité d’Orientation de l’Agence de Recherche pour le Développement, Paris.
Dr Frison was actively involved in the creation of the Alliance of the 15 CGIAR Centres. He was Chair of the Alliance Executive in 2007 and 2008 and in that capacity contributed to the CGIAR reform process, first as a member of the Scoping Team in 2007, and then as a member of the Change Steering Team in 2008.

In October 2007 Dr Frison was nominated Extraordinary Professor (part-time) at the Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium. He has also been a member of the International Advisory Council of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. As of March 2009 he is a member of the Executive Board of the Global Crop Diversity Trust.

Dr Frison is a Belgian national and has published over 150 scientific articles.

Peter Hazell has devoted most of his career to research and advisory work on policy issues related to agricultural development. Initially trained as an agriculturalist in England, he completed his PhD in agricultural economics at Cornell University in 1970. After a post-doctoral assignment with the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne where he worked on adjustment issues facing British agriculture following the UK’s accession to the EC, he joined the World Bank to pursue a research career in international agricultural development.

From 1972 to 2005 he held various research and management positions at the Bank and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). He is currently a Visiting Professor at Imperial College London and a Professorial Research Associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London.

Peter’s extensive and widely cited publications include works on new methods of using mathematical programming to solve farm and agricultural sector planning problems under risk; the impact of technological change on growth and poverty reduction; the appropriate role of agricultural insurance in developing countries; agriculture’s growth linkages to the rural non-farm economy; sustainable development strategies for marginal lands; and the role of agriculture and small farms in economic development.

Peter has worked extensively throughout Africa, Asia, the Middle East and Latin America and has advised several key donor agencies on their agricultural development strategies. He was elected a Fellow of the American Agricultural Economics Association in 2005, and his work in India was recognized through the award of DSc (Honoris Causa) by Tamil Nadu Agricultural University in 2004. Peter currently works on bio-energy issues related to agriculture, the links between agriculture and the environment, and strategies for agricultural development in Africa.

Claudio Lenoci was born in Bari and graduated in economics and commercial accounting. He has held governance positions in major public and private companies. He was a member of the Italian Parliament from 1979 to 1994, four legislatures in a row, and played a role of leading importance within the Interior Committee, the Education Committee and more prominently the Foreign Affairs Committee. He was Under-Secretary of State for Education at the end of the 80s, Under-Secretary of the Board of Trade at the beginning of the 90s and also Under-Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for three years.

From 2002-2011 he was the Director of the Rome office of the ILO (International Labour Organization). Currently he is a Board member of statutory auditors of various Italian companies and a member of the Board of Directors of Berger & Berger.

Lady Malloch-Brown is an Independent Humanitarian Affairs Consultant based in London. She was the Vice Chair of the Refugees International (RI) Board for 12 years and has been an active supporter since 1986, when she worked at the Sawyer Miller Group, a New York-based strategic and political consulting firm. She is also a co-founder of the Washington Circle, an outreach group targeted at women in Washington, DC, who are interested in humanitarian affairs; the Circle also has groups in New York, Wyoming, Chicago and Boston.

She holds a BA in Political Science from Denison University and a Masters of International Affairs from Columbia University (SIPA). She also served as a Program Officer for Eastern Europe at the Soros Foundation. In this capacity, she worked with a variety of technology exchange and educational programs in Romania, Czechoslovakia, Poland and other eastern European countries. 

Current Board memberships include Refugees International; the International Rescue Committee UK; Commissioner of the Women’s Refuge Commission; the Columbia University Scholars Program; The Chiari and Syringomelia Foundation (CSF); and, Co-Chair of the CSF Baltimore and Greater Washington Chapter.

Alexander Müller is presently the Assistant Director-General of the Natural Resources Department at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO). He is a National of Germany and holds a Masters in Social Sciences (Sociology and Political Sciences) from the Philipps Universitat in Marburg, Germany.

He is the acting focal point for a variety of FAO initiatives including the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security, the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) as well as the High-level Panel on Sustainable Development.

From 2008 to 2011 he was Chair, of the UN System Standing Committee on Nutrition (UNSCN).

Before joining the Organization, Alexander held various positions within the German Government. Acting as State Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Consumer Protection, Food and Agriculture, in Berlin, Germany from 2001 to 2005. Prior to this, he was a Member of Parliament, Hesse, Germany; Chair of the Caucus of the Green Party and Member of the Committee of Environmental Affairs, of the Finance Committee and of the Committee for New Media in Wiesbaden, Germany. From 1992 to 1995 he was State Secretary at the Hessian Ministry of Youth, Family and Health Affairs.

Shivaji Pandey was born and raised in India, where he also had his early education. He obtained his MS and PhD in Plant Breeding and Plant Genetics from the University of Wisconsin, USA.

In 2006, Dr Pandey was appointed Director, Plant Production and Protection Division, FAO, Rome to lead work on increasing production and quality of all food and non-food crops to enhance food security and livelihoods especially of rural as well as urban poor. The work of the Division involves conservation and sustainable use of plant genetic resources, seed production, development and deployment of improved cultivars, use of appropriate agronomic practices, cropping systems, conservation agriculture, organic farming, and integrated pest management among others. International Treaties and Commissions such as ITPGRFA (International Treaty for Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture), GPA (Global Plan of Action), IPPC (International Plant Protection Commission), International Code of Conduct on Pesticides, and Rotterdam Convention also form parts of the Division’s work. In 2005, he joined Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN as Director of Agricultural Support Systems Division (AGS).

He worked for over 30 years in international agricultural research and development, serving as a scientist, Regional Representative for South America, Director of Maize Program, and Director of African Livelihoods Program at International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Mexico and in its outreach programs.

He chairs the Inter-Departmental Working Group on Biotechnology at FAO which integrates research, development, and policy work on biotechnology of the Organization for agriculture, forestry, and fisheries.

Among honors and awards he includes DSc from the Maharana Pratap University of Agriculture and Technology (India), Fellowship to the American Society of Agronomy, Fellowship to the Crop Science Society of America, and special recognitions from the governments of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Vietnam. He has also authored or co-authored over 150 publications.

After over 37 years of work in international agricultural research and development, Dr Pandey retired from FAO in January 2012. He will now devote his energies and experiences to writing and talking about globally important agricultural issues and to community work in India and abroad.

Luis Téllez holds a BA in Economics from the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de Mexico (ITAM) and a PhD in Economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is currently Chair of the Board and CEO of the Mexican Stock Exchange. In the past 20 years he served as Secretary of Communications and Transportation (2006-2009), Secretary of Energy (1997-2000) and Chief of Staff of President of Mexico (1994-1997). Téllez was also Deputy Secretary of Agriculture (1990-1993).

As a public servant, he was a key player in crucial policy decisions to improve the structure and the behaviour of the Mexican economy in macroeconomic, agricultural, financial and energy issues, such as: putting in place the most ambitious program to expand Mexican transportation infrastructure based on public and private financing; participating in putting together the financial package that allowed Mexico to overcome the financial crisis of 1995; participating in the design of the bailout program of the Mexican financial system in 1995-1997; leading the expansion of infrastructure for power generation participating and transmission during the late nineties; leading the expansion of the oil and natural gas production in Mexico; participating in the establishment of the Fully Funded Pension System in Mexico. Téllez drafted the law which allowed communal land holders to turn their ownership to full property rights, and which also clearly defined full propriety rights to the Mexican rural lands. He was responsible for negotiating the agricultural sector in NAFTA, among others policy initiatives.

In the private sector he led the Carlyle Group in Mexico (2003-2006), and was CEO of Desc (2001-2003) one of Mexico’s most important industrials companies. He was a member of the board of FEMSA, Grupo México, BBVA Bancomer, Sempra Energy and Global Industries. He is the Mexican associate of McLarty Associates and a member of several nonprofit organizations including the Mexican Council of Foreign Affairs.