Christian Giesel is interim Managing Director and Marketing Head at Syngenta South Africa and holds a MSc in Biotechnology completed at Forest and Agriculture Biotechnology Institute at the University of Pretoria.
Syngenta forms part of the Syngenta Group of companies specializing in agricultural solutions focused on seed, crop protection and digital agricultural solutions and is the world’s leading supplier of crop protection solutions. The group has a permanent workforce of 59 000 people across the world with a core focus on research and development in agriculture, with a 2 billion US$ spend on agricultural research and development each annum.
His career at Syngenta spans over 12 Years having worked in various geographies on the African continent in sales, business development and marketing roles. Key projects have included the development of the smallholder business in Southern and East Africa on the “ A good Farmer knows” campaign focused on uplifting 82 000 smallholder corn growers to adopt selected breeding seed hybrids and crop protection technologies to realize harvest and yield improvements; the introduction and growth of financing and product + models for commercial growers in South Africa, introducing 3D 90 crop application technologies reducing crop protection drift and improving target deposition as well as new the launch of new crop protection solution technologies including Adepydin™ containing formulations providing a step changes to growers on crop disease control.
The passion for agriculture extends to his private pastime, continuously looking to improve the culture and select line breeding of threatened and endangered orchid species.