Stefan Heinke

Stefan has held various roles in the agricultural industry, starting as an in-house lawyer for Africa and the Middle East, later serving as the Global Mergers & Acquisitions and Business Development Manager. More recently, he worked for over ten years on sustainability projects, where his professional passion was to align business goals with development and sustainability objectives outlined in the Sustainable Development Goals. In his last position, he managed partnerships for Bayer’s Crop Science division with development organizations and think tanks. In this role, he drove collaboration and initiatives aimed at empowering smallholders, reducing emissions in agriculture, and enhancing agricultural sustainability in terms of water use, biodiversity, and soil health. Stefan co-initiated GSI’s workshop series on digital agriculture and its project on policy advice for empowering women in rural areas of emerging economies. He served as a member of the Executive Board of the Round Table for Responsible Soy and was part of the Steering Committee of the Collaborative Soy Alliance. He was a longtime Steering Committee member of the African agricultural development initiative Farm to Market Alliance, which is hosted by the World Food Program. He currently works as a consultant, particularly as an advisor and shareholder for Chanzi Ltd, a startup operating in Tanzania and Kenya that uses organic waste to sustain the larvae of the Black Soldier Fly for sale as sustainable feed. He holds a PhD in Environmental Law from the University of Bonn and a Postgraduate Diploma in Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development from Imperial College London.