My key interst is to work on a major societal challenge of the 21st century: how to feed a growing world population in a sustainable and inclusive manner which strengthens resilience to climate change and incorporates concerns for planetary security. This challenge is reflected in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN, 2015) and the Paris climate agreement (UNFCCC, 2016) and requires a growing interest in long-run food and nutrition security.

I am chief economist at Wageningen Economic Research and Special Professor of ’Macroeconomic assessment of the circular and bioeconomy’at Wageningen University. He is involved in the water-climate-energy-food nexus, food security and biobased & circular economy themes. He has worked on the fields of bioeconomy, agricultural policy reforms (CAP reform), (indirect) land use change, biobased policies (RED), forestry (REDD),  trade liberalisation (WTO, impact on developing countries), climate change (adaptation and mitigation policies) and, technology at macro (international knowledge spill overs between countries, (productivity) impact of GMO’s) and micro (innovation at farm level) level. He has published many articles in international journals in these fields. He has very extensive expertise in managing EU projects and consortia. Currently he is coordinating the H2020 SUPREMA project to design a EU agricultural modelling strategy, the H2020 MINDSTEP (agricultural modeling) project, and co-leading the Biomonitor project to monitor the EU bioeconomy.  Recently he coordinated the SUSFANS (Sustainable Food and Nutrition Security), FOODSECURE Integrated FP7 Project and the SAT-BBE (Sustainable Assessment Tool- BioBased Economy)  project. In addition he is and was in charge of several national and international framework projects (iMAP, ENGAGE, EUruralis). He is coordinating the international MAGNET CGE modeling consortium, is an active member of the International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium (IATRC), Agricultural Modeling Intercomparison and Improvement Project (Agmip), a consortium member of the Global Trade Analyses Project (GTAP) and Senior Research Fellow at the Mansholt Graduate School.