Advisory Board

Our advisory board consists of people from research and development and the agribusiness sector. The advisory board provides us strategic advice, aids in the orientation of future research work and supports us in the initiation of strategic cooperations and partnerships.

Volkmar Keuter

Head of Department Environment and Resources, Fraunhofer UMSICHT

Volkmar Keuter heads the Department of Environment and Resources at the Fraunhofer Institute for Environmental, Safety, and Energy Technologies UMSICHT in Germany. His work focusses on new materials, lighting, nutrient recovery, and cultivation processes for Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) systems, for instance to develop integrated food production systems for cities.

Andreas Kochs

Deputy Managing Director,
Euregio Rhein-Waal

Andreas Kochs is the Deputy Managing Director at Euregio Rhein-Waal, which aims at improving and intensifying cross-border cooperation between Germany and the Netherlands. Furthermore, he is responsible for program management for Interreg Deutschland-Nederland, a European funding instrument providing financial support for cooperation projects along European borders.

Ulrich Schurr

Professor and Head of Plant Sciences (IBG-2), Forschungszentrum Jülich

Ulrich Schurr is a plant physiologist and heads the Institute of Plant Sciences at Forschungszentrum Jülich, Germany. He coordinates the German Plant Phenotyping Network, is chairman of the ESFRI project EMPHASIS, and president of the International Plant Phenotyping. Schurr leads the Bioeconomy Science Center and initiated BioeconomieREVIER to establish a model region for sustainable bioeconomy in a coal-phase-out area in Germany.

Burkhard Sagemüller

Head of Development,
LEMKEN GmbH & Co. KG

Burkhard Sagemüller completed an apprenticeship as an agricultural machinery mechanic and later studied agricultural machinery technology at Cologne University. After working at the agricultural machinery manufacturer Claas for many years, he became Head of Development at Lemken in 2017. Due to his committee work, e.g. with VDMA, the Association of German Mechanical and Plant Engineering e.V., he has established extensive national and international networks.

Christiane Underberg

Entrepreneur, Underberg

Christiane Underberg is a German entrepreneur and from 1982 was for many years the managing director of Semper idem Underberg GmbH, the main company of the spirits manufacturer Underberg in Rheinberg. Today she is deputy chairwoman of the supervisory board of Semper idem Underberg AG, while also engaging in voluntary work in many fields supporting sustainable development.

Gerrie van de Ven

Assistant Professor, Department of Plant Sciences, Wageningen University

Gerrie van de Ven is an agronomist currently working at the plant production systems group at Wageningen University. Her main research interest is the relation between agriculture and its environment at the farm level or above, focussing on systems level analysis and sustainability. As such, she has investigated a variety of systems, including mixed farming in the Netherlands, multi-functional agriculture, biofuel production in Europe and Africa, or home garden systems in Ethiopia.