Our Network

Alyson is an executive with over twenty-five years’experience in public health spanning healthcare, academic, non-ex, commercial and as a global nutrition lead within the food industry.

Alyson is a board member for numerous private and public sector organisations, a former Business Fellow at the University of Oxford and Vice-Chair of the British Nutrition Foundation.

Andrew leads Gallup’s public sector divisions in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He is responsible for Gallup’s global research programmes in the regions, partnering with charities and governments.

In addition to this role Andrew is Executive Director of Gallup’s UN partnerships leading collaborations on an array of topics including global food insecurity, curbing the rise of NCDs and diet quality.

Dr. Carol Henry is a Professor of Nutrition, College of Pharmacy and Nutrition, University of Saskatchewan, where she teaches and advises in nutrition and dietetics at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

She is an internationally recognized leader in Global Food Security and Nutrition with 25 years of global experience, who has led multiple large scale, multifaceted, cross disciplinary research projects aimed at improving food security, economic livelihood, and well-being of populations in the Global South and North. She is an advocate for pulses (bean, peas, chickpeas) for human and environmental wellbeing. She takes a community-based, participatory approach to research. This approach allows her to collaborate respectfully with community partners in finding solutions for problems that impedes wellbeing and livelihood. To that end has led a multi-disciplinary, multisectoral partnership administered by the Canadian International Food Security Research Fund, by the International Development research Centre and Global Affairs Canada.

The Pluses of Pulse initiative – built on a more than 20-year partnership between the University of Saskatchewan and Hawassa University, Ethiopia — combined proven and replicable exemplars in the cultivation of pulses crops on the vibrant experience of rural small holder farmers, especially women farmers, in Southern Ethiopia. Its immense impact has been in improved food security and nutrition among farmers and their households, better agriculture resilience, affordable, nutritious, pulse food products, nutrition education, more sustainable livelihood in the face climate adversity, and women’s empowerment in household decision making.

Her research work in Northern communities (Indigenous/non Indigenous) in Canada, is aimed at applying advanced technologies in promoting production/consumption of safe, nutritious, and healthy food while ensuring environmental sustainability.

Dr. Henry continue to address key knowledge gaps in pulse-based product nutrition education in seeking to address food security and nutritional deficiencies in mothers, children and youth in diverse situations. In 2017 she received the University of Saskatchewan’s prestigious W. George Ivany Internationalization Award, for her outstanding contributions to global health research in food, food systems innovation and health promotion.

He works to improve bean and other legume crop climate resilience, and has interests in using bean Crop Wild Relatives to enhance crop abiotic stress responses.

Dr. Christine Negra collaborates with development, research, and finance organizations to address climate and agri-food system challenges.

As an Extension agent, a soil chemist, a program leader, and a strategic advisor, she has over 25 years of experience linking science to agriculture, policy, and markets.

With expertise in narrative change and behavioral science, help make preparing and eating beans accessible, enticing, and culturally relevant to the masses. By connecting the dots between beans and people’s unique needs, values, and cultures, we can shift the perception of beans and drive engagement. Created tested narratives will serve a diverse ecosystem of organizations that promote and market beans, including nutrition professionals.

Jeff develops and manages crop improvement, capacity development, legume and dryland seed systems investments as a Senior Program Officer for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The crop improvement grants are focused on increasing the genetic gain of CGIAR and African national programs breeding programs, including the application of modern breeding program best practices, and the integration of molecular markers and associated tools to enable greater genetic gains. This work includes project design, implementation support and technical and financial oversight (with specific grant examples noted below).

Prior to coming to BMGF 11 years ago, Jeff was a public plant breeder and research scientist at the University of California, Riverside developing legume varieties for growers in the state and also, with the support of USAID funding, was worked with 5 African National programs to support the performance of their programs.

Prior to that, he worked for three years at a small private sector company working to improve wild rice in California and before that spent three years in Kenya working for the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA).

Jeff received his PhD in Genetics in 1984 from the University of California, Davis and MSc in Vegetable Crops in 1979 also from UC Davis.

Dr. Michael Clark is a Senior Researcher of Sustainable Food Solutions at the University of Oxford, with a joint appointment at the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment and the Department of Biology.

His research focuses on identifying the links between food and the triple challenge of biodiversity, climate change, and human wellbeing. In this work, he is interested in identifying pathways to restructure food and food systems in ways that can mitigate human impacts on climate and biodiversity whilst supporting human wellbeing.

Before joining the University of Oxford in 2018, MIke completed a PhD in Natural Sciences and Resource Management at the University of Minnesota.

Over 30 years’ experience in agricultural research, teaching and management in both Australia and overseas. He has developed a national and international reputation in agricultural science especially in the fields of crop physiology, production agronomy, farming systems, genetic resources, breeding research in cereal, grain and pasture legumes and oilseed crops. Professor Siddique has conducted research on adaptation of crops to dryland environments and the phenological, morphological, physiological, biochemical and genetic traits that enable crops to cope with various abiotic stresses.

He has published more than 680 scientific papers and book chapters /books. Professor Siddique is the Highly Cited Researcher (Hi Ci) in 2021 in two categories: (i) Agricultural Sciences (ii) Plant and Animal Science (Thomson Reuters/ Clarivate Analytics). Professor Siddique’s Google Scholar h-index: 95 and citations: 34,526 (dated 24 July 2022).

Professor Siddique the recipient of national and international awards including: Urrbrae Memorial Award, Member of the Order of Australia (AM), 2014 Western Australian Year of the Award (CitWA), the Dunhunag Award by China’s Gansu Provincial Government. He received the Friendship Award from the Chinese Central Government (the highest award for a foreign expert) in recognition of his outstanding contributions to agricultural science and education in China over the years. Professor Siddique was the Western Australian Indian of the Year 2021.Professor Siddique is one of the three finalists for the Western Australian Scientist of the Year 2022 Award (the winner will be announced on 29th August)

Professor Siddique has also trained numerous Honours, MSc and PhD students. He has developed an extensive network of scientists within Australia and has also established a diverse range of overseas (China, India, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Malaysia, East Timor, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Europe, Canada, USA) collaborative research and educational projects. He holds a number of national and international committee positions.

Andy Jarvis is the Director of the Future of Food at the Bezos Earth Fund. He has worked for over 20 years in research and development to support the delivery of food security and environmental sustainability in the food system. His research has focused on data-driven policy analysis on various topics, from agrobiodiversity conservation to climate impacts and adaptation. Andy holds a Ph.D. in Geography from King’s College London and is based in Cali, Colombia.

Irina is Chief Marketing Officer & Commercial Director, Northern Europe at Kraft Heinz, she was appointed in April 2022.

She has over 20 years of marketing experience with stints at Unilever and Barilla. Most recently at Barilla, she was Global Vice President Marketing – New Business Model Innovations. Here she helped future proof the business through new business models and digital transformation.

Prior to this, she held various marketing roles at Unilever with increasing responsibility across Personal Care, Foods, and Ice cream divisions, driving global brands like Wall’s as well as the disruptive innovation agenda.

Irina is excited about the current challenge of nurturing the love for Heinz, a quintessentially British icon, which can be found in 9 out of 10 UK households. She is passionate about growing Kraft Heinz’s portfolio of iconic products, community initiatives like ‘Ask For Henry’, Heinz’s charity partnership with Magic Breakfast, and the ESG agenda across products, packaging and the supply chain.

Irina is a fellow at the Marketing Academy and was included in Campaign’s 2022 Power 100 Marketers ranking list.

Jean Claude Rubyogo is the Leader of the Bean Programme and Director of PABRA at the Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (The Alliance). For more than 30 years, he has focused on impactful seed systems research and development, seed delivery systems, and inclusive agricultural enterprise development. He has led multi-country public-private partnership initiatives and multi-disciplinary teams developing and deploying sustainable and impact-oriented bean and other legume seed systems in member countries of the Pan Africa Bean Research Alliance (see http://www.pabra-africa.org). He has co/-authored more than 80 publications on bean research and development.

Michiel Bakker is an accomplished senior strategic, multi-disciplined, global ‘services and experiences’ business leader, grounded in hospitality with a touch of technology. As the visionary behind Google’s celebrated flagship Food@Work program, he brings deep experience in global operations, people, project, program, design / development, change management and food systems.

He presently leads Google’s Real Estate and Workplace Services’ (REWS) Global Programs Team (= Food, Transportation, Sustainability, ‘Global Events, Amenities and Guest Services’, Health and Performance, Placemaking, Food for Good) with overall responsibilities for the design, development and ongoing delivery of REWS global workplace programs & services to over 250K+ individuals around the world (55+ countries).

He is an active contributor to various Advisory Boards around the world, including the Culinary Institute of America (USA) Menus of Change Business Leadership Council, the Yale Center for Customer Insights’ Advisory Board (USA), the EAT Advisory Board (Sweden), and the Food & Nature Board of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. He is also an Executive Advisor for the Future Food Institute (Bologna, Italy), a member of the James Beard Foundation Board of Trustees and a member of the Dutch startup Orbisk Supervisory Board.

Before joining Google in 2012, Michiel spent two decades in global hotel and food and beverage operations, creating and building out partnerships, leading hotel F&B developments, openings, and food experience design.

Michiel holds an Executive MSc degree in Real Estate and Construction Management from the University of Denver Daniels College of Business (CO), a Master of Hospitality Administration degree from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas), a MBA degree from the University of Bradford, United Kingdom) and a Bachelor’s Degree Hotel Administration from the Hotel Management School Maastricht (The Netherlands).

Paul is a strategic innovator and executive leader with twenty five [25]+ years of expertise managing complex stakeholder relationships, designing campaign strategies. He possesses strong business acumen, exceptional advocacy skills, and the ability to build deeply engaging relationships to influence decision makers. With an extensive knowledge of the not-for-profit sector, he is able to improve practices, drive change, and deliver impactful solutions to complex problems alongside communities around the world. Paul starts movements that make global impact and drives change in sustainability and food systems with his ability to design narratives that entice people to get onboard.