Douwe Zijp

Story

Douwe brings a wealth of experience in the seed industry. Initially trained in business economics, he executed different management positions at the Dutch Natural Gas Corporation and at AgrEvo Benelux in Germany. He joined Nunhems Group (later Bayer Crop Science Vegetable Seeds) as Chief Financial Officer in 1998 and served 10 years as Chief Executive Officer until 2013. After that, he became Chief Executive Officer at Incotec Group, the seed enhancement company.

Douwe has held a number of non-executive board positions in different seed and agro companies. He also served on the board of seed associations such as Plantum and the International Seed Federation. He provides advice to Temasek on agri-related activities. 

Half his life has been spent traveling, visiting vegetable fields and growers all over the world. He has a passion for seeds, for strategic planning and people development, and he strongly believes in East-West Seed’s mission to improve smallholder farmers' income. 

Douwe is married to Wia and has three grown-up children living with their partners in the Netherlands. He recently welcomed a beautiful granddaughter.

Bio

Team : Supervisory Board

Current position : Member, Supervisory Board

Works for East-West Seed since : 2020

Based in : Global

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Business Economics, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
Executive programs at Wageningen University and Harvard Business School

Other Team Members

Ard Groot

Ard Groot comes from seven generations of seedsmen who formed the foundations of the Dutch seed industry in Enkhuizen, The Ne...

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Simon Groot

Simon N. Groot is the founder of East-West Seed and the World Food Prize Laureate 2019.Simon Groot is a 6th generation descen...

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Rutger Groot

Rutger Groot is a member of the supervisory board of East-West Seed (since 2006) and concurrently chairs the East-West Seed K...

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Dilip Rajan

Dilip is the Chief Operating Officer on the East-West Seed Managing Board. He joined East-West Seed as General Manager for In...

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Cathlea Barote

Cathlea is East-West Seed's Chief People Officer with extensive HR experience, both at country and regional level.As CPO, Lea...

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Joost van Elzakker

Joost is East-West Seed's Chief Commercial Officer ensuring we maintain strong connections with - and development of our prod...

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G.C. Shivakumar

G.C. Shivakumar (GC) is the General Manager of East-West Seed India since March 2021. GC has over 25 years of agribusiness ex...

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Katalin Pákozdi

Katalin is East-West Seed's Chief R&D Officer, leading the company's breeding strategy and direction.Katalin brings the r...

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Ratiporn Ratcharoen (Ning)

 Ratiporn (Ning) is East West Seed’s Chief Finance Officer and leading the development and execution of strategies...

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Jean-Christophe “JC” Filippi

Jean-Christophe “JC” Filippi is the Chief Executive Officer of the East-West Seed Group. Prior to joining Ea...

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Michel Devarrewaere

Michel has over 30 years of experience in the seed industry in both the public and private sectors. He worked for Monsanto in...

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