CoFSA Adviser, UNDP 
Charlotte is the Practice Advisor to the Conscious Food Systems Alliance. She has been working on food systems and nutrition for over two decades, with NGOs (Action Contre la Faim, Groupe URD), and UN FAO for 12 years, as well as with various organisations as a consultant since 2017 (SUN Secretariat; 4SD/Food Systems Summit Dialogue Support Team). She worked primarily in Afghanistan and sub-Saharan Africa, before working at the global level. She is also an instructor of Ananda Yoga and meditation; and co-founded the NGO Listening Inspires. She presently lives in Burgundy, France, where she and her husband are creating a retreat centre. 

CEO, Africa Graal Innovation (AGRi’IN), Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso 
Nomandé Prosper KOLA is an expert in agribusiness, rural finance, and agricultural innovation facilitation. He is also the founder and CEO of Africa Graal Innovation (Agri’IN), based in Ouagadougou. With over 15 years of experience in West Africa, he supports governments, cooperatives, microfinance institutions, and development partners in transforming agrifood value chains through collaborative innovation for mechanization and financial inclusion. As a consultant for GIZ, FAO, AGRA, iCRA, CIRAD and other international organizations, he designs and implements sustainable business and innovation partnership models. Deeply committed in developing intra-personal capacities for better partnerships, he advocates for resilient, inclusive, and sustainable agrifood systems, promoting cooperation and shared prosperity. 

Executive Secretary, Global Ecovillage Network of Africa (GEN Africa) 
Sonita Mbah is a multi-award-winning regenerative designer, passionate food grower, and facilitator. She co-initiated the Bafut Ecovillage, an off-grid learning center in Northwest Cameroon, and served for over a decade as Administrator of Better World Cameroon. As Executive Secretary of the Global Ecovillage Network Africa, she supports regenerative community building and social enterprise development across the continent. Sonita is deeply committed to healing colonial trauma, having trained in the Principles of Collective Trauma Healing with Thomas Hübl. She also serves as the Communications Coordinator at the Pocket Project. 

Professor of Agroecology and Co-Director, Institute for Agroecology, University of Vermont
V. Ernesto Méndez is Professor of Agroecology at the University of Vermont (UVM), where he is the faculty co-director of the Institute for Agroecology. His research and teaching focus on agroecology, smallholder coffee systems, participatory action research (PAR), and transdisciplinary research approaches. He has over 25 years of experience working with smallholder and Indigenous farmers in Latin America and collaborating in agroecology efforts around the world. Since 2022, he serves as vice-president of the board of directors of the Latin American Scientific Society for Agroecology (SOCLA).  Ernesto was born and raised in El Salvador and maintains deep connections with his Latin American roots. 

Executive Director, Yale Research Initiative on Innovation and Scale (Y-RISE), Yale University 
Neela is the executive director at the Yale Research Initiative on Innovation and Scale (Y-RISE) at Yale University, which focuses on developing the science around scaling policy interventions. Neela is a behavioral scientist by training with phenomenal experience in multiple areas such as consulting, teaching, researching, and writing. Prior to joining Yale, among her many roles, she helped set up the Centre for Social and Behaviour Change (CSBC) at Ashoka University, where she also served as a director for a few years. Neela holds a PhD in marketing from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta. 

Team leader, Office of Innovation, FAO, Rome.
Aurelie Toillier is senior scientist in innovation management with over 15 years of experience leading multi-stakeholder R&I initiatives for agrifood system transformation across Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Passionate about developing capacities to innovate in individuals and organizations for sustainability transitions, she combines action-research, capacity development interventions, and strategic engagement to revisit thinking and practice of agricultural innovation toward more open, responsible inclusive and impactful approaches. She is a researcher at CIRAD and joined FAO in 2019. Since 2023, she has been co-leading the Unit 3 ‘Policies, services and capacities for agricultural innovation systems’ of the Office of innovation. Her academic achievements include a PhD in Agronomic sciences, a MScs in environmental sciences and a number of peer-reviewed papers and books.