Stefan Tangermann was until end-2008 director for Trade and Agriculture at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Paris. Before joining the OECD in 2002, Tangermann was a professor of economics and agricultural economics at the universities of Frankfurt/Main and Göttingen. He is now professor emeritus at the Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development, University of Göttingen. His academic work has concentrated on the need and options for reforming agricultural policies in OECD countries, and on strengthening the rules for agricultural trade, with a particular emphasis on the WTO.

Tangermann is a Member of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities and was its president from 2012 to 2016. He was a member of the Scientific Advisory Council of the Federal Ministry of Consumer Protection, Food and Agriculture in Germany and of the Science Council of Germany. Tangermann is a fellow of the European Association of Agricultural Economists and of the German Agricultural Economics Association.

He has been a member of the Steering Committee of the High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition (HLPE-FSN) of the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) since October 2021.

He is a national of Germany.