Bioversity International announces changes to Board of Trustees leadership

Bioversity International, a global research for development organization focusing on the use and conservation of agricultural and forest biodiversity, announces changes in its Board of Trustees, as of 1 January 2014.

Cristián Samper will become Chair of the Bioversity International Board of Trustees.

Samper is President and CEO of the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) in New York. Samper previously was the Director of the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. Prior to joining the Smithsonian, he was the founder and first director of the Alexander von Humboldt Institute, the national biodiversity research institute of Colombia.

Samper succeeds current Board Chair Paul Zuckerman, who has led Bioversity’s Board since March 2010. Zuckerman will join the Board of the CGIAR Consortium in January 2014.

The incoming Vice Chair of the Bioversity International Board of Trustees is Carl Hausmann. Hausmann has more than 35 years of experience in the agribusiness and food industries and has successfully led a publicly-held company in Europe, as well as businesses in North America, South America, and Africa. Hausmann served as Managing Director of Global Government and Corporate Affairs of Bunge Limited, a leading global agribusiness and food company, from 2010 until his retirement in 2012. He served as Vice Chair of the CGIAR Consortium Board through December 2013.

Please find a list of the members of Bioversity’s Board of Trustees online