Luis Miguel Etchevehere is the Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries of the Argentine Republic. He graduated as a lawyer from the National University of the Littoral in 1986. From 2012 to 2017, he chaired the Rural Society Argentina. He has served as Chairman in the Federation of Rural Associations of Mercosur from 2014 to 2015. In addition, he held the position of Director of the World Farmers' Organization and was elected its vice-president in 2017. He has an active participation in the international agenda, both in the public sphere and in different global forums of farmers and/or industry and trade representatives, focused on topics such as food security, sustainable production, climate change, effectiveness of sanitary standards. In his keynote, he will emphasizes the importance of good regulatory practices during the global meeting.

Andrés Murchison is the Secretary of Food and Bioeconomy of the Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries of the Argentine Republic. He has a Master in Science, Shipping Trade and Finance degree from City University Business School, London. Since 1993 he worked in Unity S.A, an agricultural family business located south of the Province of Cordoba and he is also the co-founder of Angus cabins of the Angus Centro Group. In 2015, he founded Afril S.A. a Uruguayan business dedicated to agricultural/farming production. He was appointed the Director and treasurer of the British Argentine Chamber of Commerce in 2017 and was in charge of the agribusiness organization in the trade mission to the United Kingdom 2017. He was the Director of the British Hospital in Buenos Aires and a delegate of the Argentine Rural Society and member of Crea Villa Valeria before being appointed the Secretary in in December 2017.

Kundhavi Kadiresan, the Assistant Director-General and FAO Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific of FAO, a development economist, has over 25 years of experience working in Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. Prior to joining FAO, she had a long career with the World Bank Group, leading high level policy dialogue and managing large loan portfolios. Since September 2015, her primary objectives are to advocate FAO’s policies, assist in regional norms and standards setting, and support the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDG-2 on achieving Zero Hunger and improved nutrition for all. She oversees FAO’s country offices in the region, managing over 300 technical projects on nutrition, agriculture, water, forestry, livestock, fisheries and climate change.

Emily Silk, Canada

Emily Silk is the Deputy Director of Technical Trade Policy Division of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. In her current position, she has had the oversight for Technical Barriers to Trade and biotechnology trade policy for the department. This includes holding responsibility for the Global Low Level Presence (LLP) Initiative, a group of 15 countries working collaboratively to explore how LLP can be managed in a way that increases trade predictability and transparency, and build consensus on the way forward towards developing international approaches to manage LLP. She joined the Canadian Food Inspection Agency in 2004. Since then, she has had a number of positions within the Government of Canada, most of which have focused on regulatory and trade policy. She will speak on how Canada is using the genetically modified (GM) food data on the FAO GM Foods Platform and she can be reached at [email protected].

Dorington Ogoyi, Republic of Kenya

Dorington Ogoyi serves as a Chief Executive Officer at the National Biosafety Authority in Kenya. He holds a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of Nairobi. He is also the National Focal Point for Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety and the FAO GM Foods Platform. He represents the African region in the Compliance Committee of the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. Previously, he has served as Director of Technical Services at the Authority and as an Associate Professor at the Department of Biochemistry and Biotechnology and Director of Research and Development at the Technical University of Kenya. He also taught for several years at the Department of Biochemistry, University of Nairobi and over the years, he has carried out research and mentored a number of graduate students in a wide range of research areas in Molecular Biology and Proteomics. He will speak about the FAO GM Foods Platform data in Kenya he can be reached at [email protected].

Martin Lema, Argentine Republic

Martin Lema is the Director of Biotechnology of the Argentinean Secretary of Agroindustry. He chairs the National Advisory Commission on Agricultural Biotechnology, which has been designated by FAO as centre of reference for the Biosafety of GM Organisms. He has served as a delegate to the Codex task force on foods derived from modern biotechnology, and the Codex Committee on methods of analysis and sampling. In both subsidiary bodies, he was chosen to co-chair the elaboration of guidelines applied to products derived from recombinant-DNA organisms. He is currently the national focal point for the FAO GM Foods Platform.

He holds an adjunct professorship in the School of Biotechnology at the National University of Quilmes, Argentina where he imparts graduate and post-graduate courses on agricultural biotechnology, introductory biotechnology and biosafety. He has also authored several publications pertaining to biotechnology, biosafety, food safety and policymaking. He will speak about how Argentina is using the data on the FAO GM Foods Platform and capacity development needs and actions: A case study on community members’ collaborations in Bhutan by Australia and Argentina. He can be reached at [email protected].  

Hiroshi Yoshikura, Japan

Hiroshi Yoshikura is an Emeritus Member at National Institute of Infectious Diseases (NIID), Japan. He started his long career with the Department of Pathology, National Institute of Health and then joined the Department of Genetics of University of Tokyo as an Assistant Professor and was promoted to Professor of Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine. In 1999, he became the Deputy Director of National Medical Center of Japan and in 2001, the Director General of NIID. Since 2005, he was appointed as Advisor to the Department of Food Safety, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. He has also served as the chair of task force on food derived biotechnology; Vice-Chair of Codex Alimentarius Commission; Bureau member, Working Party on Biotechnology, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and Chair of Technical Advisory Group to Expanded Program of Immunization for Western Pacific. He will speak about the relevant Codex activities and GM food safety assessment and he can be contacted at [email protected].

Jason Dietz, United States of America

Jason Dietz is a Senior Policy Analyst with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). He coordinates cross-cutting biotechnology-related activities in FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN). In this role, he regularly provides technical and policy input to CFSAN and its interagency partners on food biotechnology issues related to food safety and regulation, food labeling, genome editing and media and scientific communication. He will speak about the experiences with sharing the results of GM food safety assessment on the Platform in USA and he can be reached at [email protected].

Mohamad Afizal bin Md Tahir, Malaysia

Mohamad Afizal bin Md Tahir is an Information Technology Assistant Officer with Department of Biosafety under the Ministry of Water, Land and Natural Resources, Malaysia. He has a Master of Science degree in Information Technology from Universiti Teknologi Mara. His main roles include providing support to his department in implementation of the Malaysian Biosafety Act 2007, administrating and managing the content for the department’s website, and other official social platforms. He provides technical back-end support for in-house biosafety database and assists the country focal point for the FAO GM Foods Platform and the Biosafety Clearing House. He will speak about GM food safety assessment on the Platform in Malaysia and he can be reached at [email protected]. 

Peter M. Magdaraog, Republic of the Philippines

Peter Magdaraog serves as the Supervising Agriculturist and Co-Vice Chair at the National Plant Quarantine Services Division and Biotech Office under the Department of Agriculture of Bureau of Plant Industry, Philippines. He has a Ph.D. in Agricultural Science from the Nagoya University, Japan. His work focuses on the formulation and implementation of plant quarantine regulations and policies, assists the laboratories in conducting plant pest diagnosis and facilitates import and export operations. He is also involved in the implementation of the biotechnology activities, facilitating evaluation of risk assessment of GMOs for field trial, commercial propagation and direct use (food, feed and for processing), reviewing condition in the Biosafety Permit of approved GM application and coordination of the post-monitoring activities related to insect and weed resistance management. He will speak about GM food safety assessment on the platform in the Philippines and he can be contacted at [email protected]. 

Orachos Napasintuwong, Kingdom of Thailand

Orachos Napasintuwong is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Kasetsart University, Thailand. She has a Ph.D. in Food and Resource Economics from University of Florida in 2004. She teaches courses on economics of biotechnology and agricultural innovation, agricultural production economics, and consumer preferences for agricultural and food products. Her research areas include ex-ante analysis of economic impacts of GM crops in Thailand; farmers’ adoption of GM maize in Vietnam; farmers’ adoption of GM papaya in Thailand; and consumers’ willingness-to-pay for GM food labeling in Thailand. She participated in the executive program on Alliance for Science Global Leadership Fellows Program, Cornell University in 2018 and the online discussion and real-time conference on socioeconomic considerations on Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety in 2013. She will speak about the current status of agricultural biotechnology in Thailand and she can be contacted at [email protected]. 

Kwehangana Musa, Republic of Uganda 

Kwehangana Musa is a Biosafety Officer at the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology, Uganda. He graduated from Makerere University in Uganda. His main responsibilities include administering the biosafety regulatory system involving risk assessment of GM organisms, biosafety monitoring and inspections and ensuring enforcement of the national biosafety guidelines. He also serves as the secretary of the National Biosafety Committee of the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology. He will speak about Uganda’s proposal for the cooperation mechanisms in Africa and he can be contacted at [email protected].

Christopher Simuntala, Republic of Zambia

Christopher Simuntala is a Senior Biosafety Officer and Technical Liaison at the National Biosafety Authority, Zambia. He has a M.Sc. in Biotechnology. He is responsible for supervision and undertaking of the development, adoption and implementation of standards and guidelines to control the registration and issuance of permits for GMOs and their products in Zambia. He also supervises and undertakes the establishment and maintenance of an integrated information management system on biosafety. He is required to liaise and collaborate with local and international organizations in order to facilitate harmonization of biosafety regulations, policies, adoption and implementation of international best practices. He is a member of the National Codex Committee in Zambia. Prior to his current position, he served as the Head of Biotechnology Laboratory for 5 years and Deputy Head of Microbiology Laboratory for 7 years at Central Veterinary Research Institute. He will speak about the Zambia’s proposal for the cooperation mechanisms in Africa and he can be contacted at [email protected].

Jennifer Holtzman, Canada

Jennifer Holtzman is the Acting Section Head of Novel Foods Section at Health Canada. She has a Ph.D. in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology from Yale University. In 2009, she joined the Health Products and Food Branch at Health Canada where she worked as an evaluator assessing novel foods, food additives, and other food products requiring pre-market safety review. Other contributions include leading the development of Canada’s guidance for submission of whole genome sequencing data to support the pre-market assessment of novel foods, feeds and plants with novel traits. She also previously served as the co-lead for a joint US-Canada working group on microbial risk assessment. She will speak about the bilateral collaboration on GM Food Safety assessment between Canada and Australia and she can be contacted at [email protected].

Tashi Yangzom, Kingdom of Bhutan

Tashi Yangzom is a Senior Food Safety Officer, Bhutan Agriculture and Food Regulatory Authority (BAFRA) under the Ministry of Agriculture and Forests, Bhutan. She has a Master’s degree in Food Policy and a bachelor degree in Food Science and Technology. Since joining BAFRA as a Food Safety Officer in 2012, she has been involved in national projects and initiatives on ensuring food safety, biosafety and implementation of biosecurity measures. In the area of biosafety, she has been involved in the initial stages of biosafety framework development, institution of biosafety administrative structures, and development of technical guidelines, institutional capacity building and advocacy programmes. She also served as the coordinator for the National Biosafety Technical Working Group and participated in FAO GM Foods Platform as the National Focal Point of Bhutan from 2013-2017. She will speak about Capacity development needs and actions: A case study on community members’ collaborations in Bhutan by Australia and Argentina and she can be contacted at [email protected].

Masami Takeuchi, FAO

Masami Takeuchi has a Ph.D. in food science and human nutrition and in 2006, she joined FAO in Rome, Italy as Food Safety Officer. Her main responsibility lies on food safety risk assessment that deals with emerging issues, technologies and cross-cutting issues. She is the manager of the global database on safety assessment results of the foods derived from GMOs. She also advises FAO Members on the use and applications innovative technologies such as whole genome sequencing for better food safety management. Since January 2017, she has been out-posted to the FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific in Bangkok, Thailand. She continues holding the responsibility in leading some of the global activities, while she takes up various regional and national initiatives on food safety to assist countries in the Asia-Pacific region for their food safety capacity development. She can be reached at [email protected].

Kosuke Shiraishi, FAO

Kosuke Shiraishi is Junior Professional Officer at the FAO in Rome, Italy. Since he took the position in March 2018, he has been involved in various activities in the area of food safety and quality such intelligence gathering on food safety issues, participation in Secretariat of the International Food Safety Authorities Network and capacity development on food safety foresight in East Africa. Before this role, he was an official of the Economic Security Division, which is the responsible division for FAO in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where he contributed to strengthening the relationship between Japan and FAO. Shiraishi holds a Ph.D. in microbiology. During his doctoral course, he did his internship at FAO for one year where he provided support in day-to-day management of the FAO GM Foods Platform and organizing relevant meetings. He can be reached at [email protected].