I am a Research Coordinator in the Research and Policy Centre team at Grain SA and seconded to the University of Pretoria under the Grain Research Programme.

The Grain Research and Policy Centre guides, coordinates, and facilitates grain and oilseed research and policy matters. In essence, the team works to understand the priorities of government and industry and set up research consortia to address these challenges. The main focus areas are crop improvement, plant health, climate resilience and human capital development.

I completed my MSc in Plant Pathology at Stellenbosch University in 2019. The focus of the project was to detail the resistance characteristics of maize against Fusarium ear rot (FER) and fumonisin accumulation. This included investigating structural, physicochemical and genetic characteristics of maize which confer resistance to FER and fumonisin accumulation. I work as a Research Coordinator in the Research and Policy Centre team at Grain SA. I primarily apply my scientific training within the Climate Resilience Consortium, but with a strong plant health background, I provide further support to the team in the other research priority areas of the industry. In 2021, I was seconded to the University of Pretoria under the Grain Research Programme to foster collaboration between industry, government and the research community.