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Biography

Erik has covered environmental research for Science for 12 years. His beat includes agriculture, forestry, fisheries, conservation biology, and related topics.

After majoring in geology at Carleton College, Erik received a master's degree from the University of California, Riverside. The escape plan from academia involved the U.C. Santa Cruz program in science communication. That led to an internship at New Scientist magazine in London, followed by a second internship at Science. The only vestige of his geological education is the occasional story about dinosaurs.

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Biography

Richard Rominger is a fourth generation Yolo County, Calif farmer, and is active in farm organizations and cooperatives. He served six years as Director (Secretary) of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, and was the Deputy Secretary at the U. S. Department of Agriculture in Washington, DC for eight years. Improving farm policy, including conservation programs, and establishing the National Organic Standards, were among his responsibilities. He served as a production agriculture advisor at UC Davis, UC Riverside, California State University Fresno, and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, and continues to serve as a special advisor to the Chancellor at UC Davis. He is chairman of Marrone Organic Innovations, a biopesticide company, is a member of the UC President's Advisory Commission on Agriculture and natural Resources, and the California Roundtable on Agriculture and the environment, and serves on the board of directors of the American Farmland Trust and Roots of Change Council. He completed a term on the UC Board of Regents.

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Biography

Anne-Marie Izac, a natural resources and environmental scientist, is a specialist in sustainable agriculture in developing countries. Her PhD is in environmental and natural resource economics (University of Western Australia) and she earned a M.Sc. in environmental sciences and an MA in environmental and natural resources economics (Washington State University).

She held academic posts in the USA and Australia, teaching economics and conducting research on natural resources management and policy issues with a focus on agriculture. She has been the Director of Research of an International Agricultural Research Centre (ICRAF) and of a French Agricultural Research Centre (CIRAD) with a mandate to work in developing countries.

She currently is the Chief Officer of the Alliance created by the fifteen International Agricultural Research Centres of the Consultative Group in International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). She was a lead author in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (Nutrient chapter) and a coordinating lead author in the International Assessment of the Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (global chapter on Policy). She has been an advisor on sustainable agriculture to the Dutch Royal Academy of Sciences.

She serves on the editorial board of the International Journal of Sustainable agriculture, and on the scientific board of the Sustainable Agriculture Initiative Platform of the agribusiness sector. She is the Vice-Chair of the Global Environmental Change and Food Systems Programme. Her publications focus on the interface between economy and ecology and the management of the natural resources and eco-system services for enhancing the sustainability of tropical and sub-tropical agricultural systems.

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Biography

Chuck joined General Mills in 2001, following the acquisition of The Pillsbury Company. He began his career in marketing with Pillsbury's Green Giant Division in 1990 after receiving his MBA from the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management. He also received a Bachelor's degree in International Relations from the University of Minnesota.

Following key brand management assignments in Green Giant, Chuck helped establish Pillsbury's category management group within the Sales Function. He later led Pillsbury's Convenience Store Sales Team and was also in charge of finding new distribution channels. This work led him into the world of E-Business where, as Director of E-Business, he launched Pillsbury into the world of Internet retailing. In addition to these roles, Chuck has been a Zone Operations Manager in General Mills' National Sales Division and Director of Ethnic Foods Sales in General Mills' International Division.

Chuck returned to his "roots," rejoining Green Giant in 2004 as Director of Business Development. In this role, Chuck was responsible for the shelf-stable vegetable business, along with agricultural initiatives and sustainability for the Green Giant brand.

In September of 2008, Chuck was named Director of Applied Sustainability for General Mills. In this new role, Chuck is responsible for helping all of the businesses at General Mills advance their Sustainability goals in an effort to reduce the companies overall environmental footprint and drive increased sales.

About General Mills

One of the world's leading food companies, General Mills operates in over 100 countries and markets more than 100 consumer brands, including Cheerios, Häagen-Dazs, Nature Valley, Betty Crocker, Pillsbury, Green Giant, Old El Paso, Progresso, Cascadian Farm, Muir Glen, and more. Headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S.A., General Mills had fiscal 2008 global net sales of US$14.9 billion, including the company's $1.2 billion proportionate share of joint venture net sales.

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Biography

Appointed November 2005 as Distinguished Fellow after having served since July 2000 as Director following a nationwide search. He also manages his family's 3,500-acre certified organic farm in south central North Dakota. Helped found Farm Verified Organic, Inc., a private certification agency, and the Northern Plains Sustainable Agriculture Society. Served numerous national/ international appointments, including USDA's National Organic Standards Board, the North Central Region's Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) administrative council, Henry A. Wallace Institute for Alternative Agriculture board of directors. Earned degrees from Yankton College in South Dakota, Hartford Theological Seminary in Connecticut, and a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Chicago. Author of numerous articles and book chapters dealing with ethics and agriculture.

He also served a three-year appointment on the National Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production operated by the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health and funded by Pew Charitable Trusts. The group issued its final report in April 2008, which included a chapter, "Toward Sustainable Animal Agriculture," written by Kirschenmann.

Kirschenmann is convening chair of a multi-state task force, Agriculture of the Middle, that focuses on research and markets for midsize American farms. The group also has established the Association of Family Farms to create standards and markets for these types of food.

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Biography

Kate Clancy is currently a food systems consultant and Senior Fellow in the Minnesota Institute for Sustainable Agriculture, University of Minnesota (she resides in University Park, Maryland). She has a Ph.D. in Nutrition Sciences from the University of California at Berkeley. Her resume includes positions at several universities (Cornell, Syracuse, and the Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems at the University of Wisconsin): the federal government (nutritionist and policy adviser at the Federal Trade Commission): and nonprofits (the Wallace Center for Agricultural and Environmental Policy, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and the National Center for Food and Agricultural Policy). She has served on numerous boards (the Society for Nutrition Education, Bread for the World, Wallace Institute for Alternative Agriculture, Consortium for Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education, and Michael Fields Agricultural Institute among others). Clancy developed a graduate course on food systems in 1982 and since then has published, taught, spoken, and consulted widely on sustainable agriculture and food systems with government agencies, universities, and nonprofits around the country. Her present interests are the research and policy facets of Agriculture of the Middle, the development of regional food systems, the relationships between land use and farm viability, and the research needed to advance sustainable agriculture and food systems policy.