SWITZERLAND – Syngenta has appointed Alexandra Brand as Chief Sustainability Officer, a newly created role in its strive to achieve sustainable agricultural production.

The newly created Business Sustainability Group working under Brand will ensure sustainable agricultural production considering the company’s Regulatory Affairs, Sustainability and Stewardship, External Affairs and Communications activities.

Alexandra Brand was Syngenta’s former Regional Director of crop protection and seed operations across Europe, Africa and the Middle East.

Having joined Syngenta in 2015, he has made numerous contributions to Syngenta’s goal of ensuring friendly operations and outcomes in agriculture to safeguard the environment.

Reporting to the CEO Erik Fyrwald, Brand will help drive the company’s sustainability agenda by supporting the already existing initiatives such as the Good Growth Plan and at the same time enhancing growth.

“We are already playing an important role in helping to feed the world and we want to do more as we go forward.

To do this we need to have sensible discussions with governments, NGOs, academics and the food chain on the regulatory, policy and societal challenges and opportunities our industry faces.

We have made real progress and we want to build on this with new and different conversations about what more sustainable agriculture will mean in the future,” said Erik Fyrwald, Syngenta CEO.

“We want to help further shape agriculture and its place in society – the position of CSO will be central in leading this.

Alexandra has a real passion for helping farmers to become more productive while managing the impacts of climate change and having to produce more with less.”

The company together with Kumato have recently launched new pepper varieties including Kumato Gran Sabor in a partnership to expand European blocky sweet pepper range with new varieties.

Recent appointments of new marketing, sales and technical managers that is, John Chaney, Eric Paysen and Marshall Gaster will not only bring diverse experience in the technical industry but also pest management skills for sustainable agriculture.

“The technology we bring to farmers can help them safely feed the world and take care of our planet – this includes reducing greenhouse gas emissions, water consumption and soil conservation.

We also play a key role in helping to preserve biodiversity and precision technology will be important in all of these areas,” said Alexandra Brand.

“I’m really excited by the opportunity to drive further change in our company and in our industry.

We are looking to create new partnerships and work together with groups we might not have worked with in the past.

We will build on the significant achievements of The Good Growth Plan, with even greater transparency and commitment from Syngenta to further improve the sustainability of global agriculture,” he added