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The IFOAM World Board |
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The IFOAM World Board. From the left to the right (back): Urs Niggli, Roberto Ugas (Vice President); Andre Leu (Vice President); Ong Kung Wai; Fabio Piccioli; Moses Kiggundu Muwanga; (front) Masaya Koriyama; Katherine DiMatteo (President); Jacqueline Haessig Alleje; Vanaja Ramprasad.
The IFOAM World Board is a diverse group of individuals working
voluntarily to lead IFOAM. The current World Board was elected at the
IFOAM General Assembly in Vignola/Italy, which took place from June 22-24, 2008. The President and the two Vice Presidents of the World Board form the Executive Board.
Current World Board Members:
President:
Katherine DiMatteo, USA
 Katherine DiMatteo is Senior Associate of Wolf, DiMatteo + Associates. From 1990 to 2006 she was the Executive Director of the Organic Trade Association in the USA. She is a founding board member and currently Secretary of the Board of The Organic Center. She has also served on the Board of Directors of the Organic Materials Review Institute, and Northeast Cooperatives, Inc. including terms as President and Treasurer. She participated as a U.S. delegate on the Organic Working Group of the Codex Committee on Food Labeling from 1995-2006. DiMatteo is internationally recognized for her efforts to build consensus on organic standards and practices, and for making the connection between Organic Agriculture and a sustainable future.
Katherine was co-opted to the IFOAM World Board in 2006. In 2008 she was elected as a World Board member and selected as President of IFOAM.
Vice President:
Andre Leu, Australia
Andre
Leu is Chair of the Organic Federation of Australia. Its role is to
develop the Australian organic sector into a major component of
Australian agriculture that delivers benefits to consumers, producers
and the Australian environment. The major activity has been working
with the Australian Government on a regulatory system for organic
products. This system will allow the organic sector control over
standards setting with the regulators enforcing it. Andre was the Chair
of the Far North Queensland Lychee Growers Association.
Andre
is an organic farmer, growing tropical fruits in Daintree, Queensland.
He has over 36 years of experience in all areas of Organic Agriculture
from growing, pest control, weed management, marketing, post harvest,
transport, grower organisations, developing new crops and education in
Australia and in many other countries.
Vice President:
Roberto Ugas, Peru
 Roberto Ugas is a
Peruvian agronomist with studies in Peru,
The Netherlands and Japan.
He is lecturer and researcher in horticulture at Universidad Nacional Agraria
La Molina, as well as a consultant in rural development, agroecology,
agrobiodiversity and organic agriculture. Roberto is main advisor to Peru's National
Association of Ecological Farmers (ANPE) and a member of the National Commission
for Organic Products (CONAPO), the advisory board that drafted the first
organic regulation in the country. He acts as representative of La Molina for
several national and international agreements, including those with ANPE and
Slow Food. He is a member of several scientific societies, including ISOFAR and
SOCLA, and of EducAndes, which promotes education for sustainable development,
and has served in the board of SEPIA, a think tank dealing with agriculture and
economy. Roberto is a member of GALCI, IFOAM's regional group in Latin America and for 15 years was involved with IFOAM's
Accreditation Programme and, later, with IOAS, having been chair of the
Accreditation Committee. He was also a member of the task force that drafted
the principles and the definition of organic agriculture.
Jacqueline Haessig Alleje, Philippines
Jacqueline Haessig Alleje was born in Switzerland and has been living in the Philippines since 1988. She is co-owner of Rizal Dairy Farms, which is engaged into dairy production since 1992. Rizal Dairy Farms also operates a catering division “Petra’s naturally – green, global, gourmet” to promote organic and healthy gourmet food as a way of life. Jacqueline is teaching “Healthy Gourmet” culinary classes at a Culinary School in Manila. She is the president of Organic Farming - Production, Training and Consultancy, Inc. (OFI), which is engaged into organic vegetable production, technology development and transfer through training and consultancy and networking with producers and the researcher community. She was founding member of the Organic Producers Trade Association and the Organic Certification Center of the Philippines, and serves as Board and EC member of OCCP and actively involved in government policy formulation for the promotion and development of organic agriculture in the Philippines.
Since 1997 she actively participated in IFOAM activities, often centered on gender issues and the producers’ perspective. She is member of the IFOAM World Board since 2005, and had been re-elected in June 2008.
Moses Kiggundu Muwanga, Uganda
 Moses Kiggundu Muwanga is the National Coordinator of the National Organic Agricultural Movement of Uganda (NOGAMU). NOGAMU is the umbrella organization that brings together the producers, processors, exporters, NGOs and other institutions involved in organic agricultural development in Uganda. Moses’ involvement in the organic sector has been twofold: firstly by offering technical and advisory support in the areas of designing and developing organic grower schemes and businesses. Secondly he has made key contributions to the structural designing and setting up of an effective National Organic Agricultural Movement.
Moses has served on the IFOAM task force for the development of Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS), and participated on the steering committee of Organic Standards East Africa (OSEA) a project run by IFOAM, and was a member of the regional standards technical working group that drafted the East African Organic Products Standards (EAOPS).
Masaya Koriyama, Japan
Masaya Koriyama has been working for a natural and organic foods home delivery company called Radish Boya (Boy) as a public relations and marketing manager since 1992. He has promoted organic food and farming to the general public in Japan for 15 years. Radish Boya started as an environmental NGO in 1977 focused on recycling movement in Japan, and began as an organic movement in 1988. Currently Radish Boya makes weekly deliveries (Box-scheme) to 96,000 households throughout Japan, making it one of the leading distributors of natural and organic farm products. Radish Boya became a member of IFOAM in 1997 and then they established IFOAM Japan in 2001 with producers, distributors, certification bodies, and NGOs to promote the Japanese organic movement.
In addition, Masaya completed masters in Global Politics (Global Civil Society) at the London School of Economics (LSE). Then he worked at IFOAM Head Office as a media fellow from November 2007 to February 2008. He is a board member of IFOAM Japan.
Here you can find an article about Masaya Koriyama published in the popular Japanese Asahi newspaper on 30 July 2008.
Ong Kung Wai, Malaysia
 Ong Kung Wai, based in Penang, Malaysia works as a consultant and trainer with Grolink, an international consultancy service for Organic Agriculture development. He functions as Administrator of Certification Alliance, a collaboration partnership of certification bodies in Asia and Europe. He is Chairperson of Organic Alliance Malaysia, a local organic sector association. He is also Director of Life Spirit, operator of a kindergarten based on Rudolf Steiner’s education method, in Penang.
Kung Wai was formerly Board member and Vice President of the International Organic Accreditation Service (IOAS), based in the USA. Kung Wai worked as Sustainable Agriculture Program Officer for Pesticide Action Network, Asia and the Pacific from 1994-98 before offering consultancy services. He was elected IFOAM World Board member in 2005 and re-elected in 2008. Since 2006, he has been the Chairperson of the IFOAM Norms Management Committee.
Urs Niggli, Switzerland
 Urs Niggli was
appointed director of the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL) in
1990. In addition, he is member of the Board of FiBL Germany
and FiBL Austria
as well as of the Czech Bioinstitut and the IBLA in Luxemburg. He was a founder
of the Swiss inspection and certification company bio.inspecta, and has been a
member of the Board of Directors since. In 2003, Urs initiated together with
Ulrich Köpke the International Society of Organic Agriculture Research (ISOFAR)
for which he has acted as vice-president since its foundation. He is member of
different advisory committees for scientific institutes and universities in Germany, Switzerland
and Denmark.
At the ETH Zürich and at Kassel
University, he is
currently teaching Organic Agriculture. He was appointed as an Honorary
Departmental Fellowship at the Aberystwyth
University in Wales.
Most recently, he helped the IFOAM EU Group to develop a
long-term Research Vision and a Strategic Research Program 2025.
Fabio Piccioli, Italy
 Fabio Piccioli is an organic farmer/technician. He has been working in Organic Agriculture since 1986, in a small cooperative founded in 1979 by young unemployed persons. In 1993, he started to work in his small organic farm in Italy producing fruit and grapes for wine. From 1994 to 2000 he was President of AIAB Emilia Romagna, the Italian Organic Association in his region. Since 1999 until June 2008 he has been member of the Regional Board of AgriBioMediterraneo, the IFOAM regional group of Mediterranean Countries, and was appointed President in 2005.
In the ’90s, he started to collaborate in different Cooperation projects on Organic Agriculture and sustainable development in Latin America, Mediterranean, Africa, etc. Since 2002, he is also working as technician in organic certification, for ICEA (Ethic and Environmental Certificate Institute) in Italy and in other countries.
Vanaja Ramprasad, India
 In the past 30 odd years Dr. Vanaja Ramprasad has travelled through valleys and villages in India to understand the mainstream development and its sector-wise impact on the poor. What impacted her understanding was the largely accepted flawed analysis as the real reasons for third world poverty and hunger. Has worked with various international agencies consulting on development related work. Being a development researcher and nutritionist, she had been involved in a study in south of India during the 80s on the impact of green revolution on small farmers in the rain fed regions. The study pointed towards the loss of biodiversity which is the basis of food security .Also the loss of genetic resources at the seed level had a phenomenal impact on farmers’ independence to save their seeds. The foundation for genetic resources, ecology and energy was initiated by her in 1994 and since then has worked intensively on seed saving for and by small farmers in a sustainable manner. Has been actively involved with the State organic farming policy. The work has spread to different eco regions of the state and other parts of south of India. Vanaja ramprasad is a member of many international networks like GRAIN, IFOAM, COMPAS.
Statutory rules governing the World Board:
Elections
Every regular General Assembly elects ten World Board members.
Candidacies must be received at least three months before the regular
General Assembly and must be endorsed by five members. A presentation
of the candidates must be sent to the members at least 60 days before
the General Assembly.
The World Board chooses an Executive Board (see § 8) from amongst the
elected members before the end of the General Assembly. The World
Board may co-opt up to three further World Board members. The World
Board may elect additional Executive Board members and replace them as
appropriate during the term.
World Board
The World Board decides all issues not yet determined by the General
Assembly. The World Board establishes rules of procedure for the World
and Executive Board and the General Assembly, which are to be approved
by the General Assembly. The World Board may set up Working Groups,
Committees, and regional or thematic task groups. It may also delegate
specific tasks to such bodies or to individuals. The World Board takes
decisions by simple majority with at least half of the members present
and by open vote. On the request of three World Board members a meeting
is called with six weeks notice.
Executive Board
The Executive Board is constituted by three to five members of the
World Board: The President and two to four Vice-Presidents. The
Executive Board represents the Federation, executes the decisions of
the General Assembly and World Board, decides on issues not yet decided
upon by the General Assembly or the World Board, reviews the
organisation performance and initiates the remedy of short-comings.
Executive Board decisions are taken by simple majority with at least
half of the members present and by open vote. IFOAM is legally
represented by two members of the Executive Board acting jointly. |
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