The Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture

Improved Variety Commercialization Toolkit

Best practices for practitioners and investors in the seed sector
Toolkit
The Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture is creating the Improved Variety Commercialization Toolkit to help strengthen the seed supply chain. The toolkit is organised into a set of tools covering all the necessary steps and activities that will ensure that only relevant varieties are developed and that the seeds are delivered successfully to the smallholding farmers.

Our Objective

What do we mean by 'Toolkit'?

The toolkit covers the pre-breeding analysis, the seed production, the marketing and commercial, and the legal activities needed to successfully deliver the seed of the relevant varieties to the small holding farmers. It follows the product life cycle process, structured into 12 stages and set the standards for public and private project managers, research institutions, and local seed companies. The process can also be logically structured into 4 phases: problem definition, solution design (concept stage to design
the profile of the new variety for the breeding community), solution creation (concrete breeding stages to create the new variety) and solution delivery. The toolkit goes into details on the steps to take for 3 out of the 4 phases: Problem definition, Solution design and Solution delivery. The solution creation is in the space of the breeding communities to develop appropriate varieties.

A visual tour

SFSA has created the Improved Variety Commercialization Toolkit to help strengthen the seed supply chain for small-holding farmers. With the help of this video, get familiar with the flow and functionality of the seeds2b toolkit website.

Why do we need a toolkit to commercialize improved varieties?

Smallholders have limited access to quality seeds of improved varieties. Seed is the cornerstone of any productivity gains at the farm gate. Despite all the effort and investment made in breeding by the public sector, many smallholder farmers in Africa and Asia still plant low-quality seeds of the same varieties used by previous generations.
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For smallholders

One step at a time
for a bigger impact
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The Seeds2B Team

This can be an overview description relating to the team members and overall organization structure required to make this team a success

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Tony Gathungu

Head of Seeds2B

Tony joined the Syngenta Foundation in 2020 from Bayer / Monsanto in Kenya. He had most recently been their Commercial Operations Lead for Sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on product access for smallholders. He had previously led international business development at Frigoken, East Africa’s largest vegetable processor and exporter, working with thousands of smallholders. During 14 years in the USA, Tony held a variety of leadership roles at Fortune 500 organizations. He holds a degree in International Business from USIU-Africa in Nairobi and an MBA in Global Business from The Lake Forest Graduate School of Business in Chicago. Tony has dual Kenyan and American citizenship.
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Tony Gathungu

Head of Seeds2B

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Herve Thieblemont

Head of Seeds2B Asia, Mekong Region Director

Herve joined the Foundation in November 2017 and is currently Seed Development Head in Asia and Mekong Region Director. His main objective is to drive innovation in challenging environments and establish public-private partnerships to accelerate poor-resource smallholders’ access to improved quality seeds. Herve worked all his career for the private seed sector, ensuring cross-functional coordination among Research and Development, Production and Supply, and Commercial teams mostly at the international level in Europe, North America, and Asia, respectively for Limagrain, Dekalb, and Syngenta. Herve grew up on an arable farm in the wheat belt in Champagne / France and holds an Engineering degree in Agronomy from AgroSup Dijon and an MBA from the Business School EM Lyon, France.
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Herve Thieblemont

Head of Seeds2B Asia, Mekong Region Director

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Nathalie Vignaux

Seeds2B Operational Excellence Lead

Nathalie moved to the Foundation in 2018. In her newly created role, she is developing a portfolio management process and matching digital tool for Seeds2B. She is very keen on challenging the organization to adopt Agile principles! Nathalie also coordinates the BMGF AVISA project in Tanzania and Nigeria. Nathalie previously managed projects in seeds production research at Syngenta, including a digital tool for climatic growing areas. Before moving to Switzerland, Nathalie spent 15 years in the USA, where she studied and then worked at Monsanto. Nathalie graduated from the Superior National Agronomy School in Toulouse, France, and holds a PhD in Plant Breeding from North Dakota State University, USA. In her free time, she enjoys learning, trekking, running, biking, skiing and yoga.
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Nathalie Vignaux

Seeds2B Operational Excellence Lead

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Camille Renou

Seeds2B Africa Technical Lead

Camille joined the Foundation in January 2012 as a seed specialist in West Africa. Before that, he had worked for Syngenta in France on the production and processing of cereal seed, primarily for hybrid barley. Since 2018, Camille expanded his role to be Seeds2B Africa’s Technical Lead. He develops and oversees the seeds strategy for Sub-Saharan Africa and coordinates the implementation of Pan-African seeds projects aiming to improve farmers’ availability and accessibility to performing varieties. Camille graduated in Agricultural Engineering from Angers, France, with majors in Plant Breeding and Seeds Production.
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Camille Renou

Seeds2B Africa Technical Lead

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Raghavender Dantapuram

Key Account Manager Seeds (India)

D. Raghavender is Key Account Manager at Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture – India in S2B division since January 2019, working closely with International organizations – CIMMYT, SCPAG and ICRISAT in developing drought tolerant maize hybrids and coordinating with seed companies in popularizing the said hybrids. Prior to this he was Business Development Manager at Syngenta India limited where he played vital role in conceptualizing and implementing a new business to provide high quality seedlings and mechanical transplanting services to rice growers by partnering with farm mechanization companies, financial institutions and social entrepreneurs in India and Bangladesh, also implemented capability development programs to address gaps in social entrepreneurs’ skills and led the successful implementation and scale up of rural experiential and educational retail stores to educate rice growers. From 2016-2019 , Raghavender was head of farm mechanization services at Coromandel International Limited, where he worked closely with state agriculture department and SERP (Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty- an autonomous society of the department of rural development) on policy formulation and implementation of custom hiring and service centers for Paddy, Sugarcane and Mango crops and was instrumental in establishing public-private partnership for Integrated Agriculture Development. He started his career in 2007 as a management trainee at Reliance Retail where he worked on fresh produce aggregation in agro food value chain and helped the firm to offer fresh produce to consumers at affordable rates. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Horticulture and post-graduation degree in Food Science and Technology from ANGRAU, Hyderabad and holds post graduate diploma in Agribusiness and Plantation Management from IIPM, Bangalore.
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Raghavender Dantapuram

Key Account Manager Seeds (India)

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