Author, journalist, and broadcaster Suzanne Campbell reports on food and farming issues for RTÉ radio's Countrywide and Drivetime programmes. She is a former series producer of RTE’s farming television series Ear To The Ground and has won two Guild of Agricultural Journalism awards including International Farming Journalist of the Year.

Suzanne has written for the Irish Times, Irish Independent, the Wall Street Journal, and reported for BBC's The Food Programme. She is the co-author of the critically acclaimed book Basket Case – What’s Happening to Ireland’s Food? and the founder of the Irish Food Writing Awards.

David Flynn joined the EPA Board in October 2023 and is the Director of the Office of Environmental Sustainability. David has responsibility for the Circular Economy, Environmental Licensing and Carbon Emissions Trading. David has over twenty years of experience in environmental science and protection. He has held various roles, most recently as a Principal Adviser in the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. Previously, he worked as Licensing Programme Manager and as Enforcement Programme Manager with the EPA. David holds a Bachelor of Science in environmental science, Master of Science, and an MBA from UCD.

Odile Le Bolloch is a scientist at the Environmental Protection Agency, with over 20 years’ experience working on sustainability and environmental issues.

She leads the EPA’s Food Waste Prevention team and is responsible for implementing the national food waste prevention programme, targeting food waste in households through the national Stop Food Waste campaign, and the Food Waste Charter to accelerate change across the supply chain and in the hospitality sector. Behavioural insight is a foundation of the programme, providing evidence and data to inform policy, behavioural change interventions and awareness campaigns, establish sectoral benchmarks and indicators, and to monitor progress.

Martin Hofler is Bord Bia’s Senior Sustainability Manager and has over 10 years’ experience working across private and public organisations to design, implement and communicate sustainability strategies. In his current role, Martin is responsible for overseeing and managing the company/manufacturing portion of Bord Bia’s Origin Green programme. This involves the project management of strategic sustainability initiatives in collaboration with the Irish food and drink industry and international stakeholders. Before joining Bord Bia, Martin worked in several global sustainability roles with leading organisations including Jacobs Engineering, PepsiCo US and Ornua Deutschland.

Martin holds a MSc. in Business Sustainability from UCD Smurfit, MSc. in Environmental Science from Trinity College Dublin and a BSc. in Environmental Science from the University of Scranton.

Richard has over 30 years’ experience in the seafood industry with a diverse range of roles ranging from working as a Marine Biologist with Mowi Ireland to General Manager of the Seafood Division at Abbeyfield Foods.

He began his career in a role to commercially develop Ireland’s eel fisheries for the Electricity Supply Board to promote angling tourism with Inland Fisheries Ireland.

Following on from this, the sales and marketing of seafood became his real passion. Working in Belgium as Sales and Marketing Manager with Pan-European Fish Auctions (PEFA) gave him a taste of the international seafood market with responsibility for sales in Europe, Asia and South America. This led to a role in the former Marketing Division of BIM where Richard worked with numerous Irish seafood companies on market research in Europe, USA and Asia. Following this he was recruited to the position of General Manager at Abbeyfield Foods where he was involved with the sale of seafood products throughout the Middle East and North Africa before returning to BIM, where he held the role of Salmon and Shellfish Manager prior to his appointment as Development and Innovation Director.

Alexa Toomey is the Head of Sustainability, Renewable Energy, and Agritech at Enterprise Ireland. Prior to taking up this role, Alexa worked in several positions across Enterprise Ireland’s Food Division, where she worked with some of our leading Irish and Multinational companies supporting them to grow and innovate sustainably from Ireland.

Alexa has 15 years’ experience in strategy development having worked across a variety of industrial policy areas during her time in Enterprise Ireland and has represented the agency on a range of national and European working groups.

Alexa is a graduate in Economics from Trinity College Dublin and holds an MA in Economics from University College Cork.

Aileen Deasy, Manager of Climate Action with Fáilte Ireland, is responsible for supporting the development and implementation of Fáilte Ireland’s Climate Action strategy, utilising her accumulated experience and research and insights available to shape practical solutions to support the industry. Aileen leads the operational delivery of the Climate Action plan working with the wider Failte Ireland teams and key stakeholders to ensure the development of a sustainable tourism sector that meets the emerging needs of the consumer.

Ciara McDonagh is the Head of Food Industry Development in Teagasc – The Irish Agriculture and Food Development Authority. She has over 18 years experience in the delivery of consultancy and technical services to Irish food businesses. Ciara leads a team of accomplished scientists and technologists working with companies of all sizes across the Irish Food Sector, supporting product and process innovation and assisting them in meeting and evolving consumer and regulatory demands. She is the assistant director of the Irish Prepared Consumer Food Centre, a state of the art food research and development centre established in 2018. Ciara has a specific interest in supporting the up-take of science-based innovations by the food industry and has interacted widely with the sector and other state agencies to this end. She has fostered national and international collaborations and works actively on a range of EU and nationally funded research projects.

I am truly passionate about sustainability and the important role that business needs to play to support our transition to a low carbon economy and more inclusive societies. I come from a consulting background, where I supported business across all sectors, in developing and implementing their sustainability and corporate social responsibility strategies.

At OBFF I am responsible for delivering on Our Purpose (OBFF’s Sustainability Strategy), working with departments across the organisation to develop more sustainable and responsible practices in our day-to-day actions, to support the business to achieve our sustainability targets and commitments.

Fergus qualified with BSc (Food) from UCC
Fergus is currently Plant and Environmental Manager at Aryzta Bakeries. Aryzta Ireland is a large bakery, producing Artisan breads and next Generation French breads for the Irish and UK market.

Currently working with Aryzta ESG Group team with reducing Scope 3 carbon emissions. Have been one of the industry representatives on CIRCULÉIRE in 2022 and were delighted to become signatories for EPA Food Waste Charter earlier this year.
Previous roles were mainly in the Dairy industry, starting in a QA role, but including Environmental (implementing ISO14001 and processing EPA license application) and ultimately Plant Manager roles.
Minimising waste has always been of paramount importance in almost every role I have been in.

Andrew McGregor is Head of Sustainability at Tesco Ireland, working to drive the success of Tesco’s Planet Plan across all areas of the business. Over the last 5 years, he has been supporting Tesco suppliers embed sustainability in their operations, initially as a Supply Chain Consultant, and most recently as Sustainability Programme Manager for Tesco Group. As Programme Manager he launched Tesco Exchange, an online marketplace connecting farmers, producers and manufacturers together, to match suppliers with surplus to others that need it.

Colum, an environmental chemist, is the manager of the Clean Technology Centre (@MTU) and has worked with CTC for over 20 years. He has extensive experience working with industry, the waste sector, local authorities and communities. Colum has worked with on wide range food waste related programes and projects including national waste characterisation studies, managing the EPA’s Stop Food Waste programme for over 10 years, developing the DAFM supported Savour Food Programme, contributing to the HSE's Green Healthcare food waste work, leading on EPA research into commercial food waste in Ireland and behaviour change interventions to reduce household food waste. He has also been involved in the establishment of the Forum on Food Waste, the development of the Food Waste Charter for Ireland and the associated tools designed to aid businesses measure their food waste consistently.

Robert Duncan, CEnv, MIEMA, CEM

Manager of Energy and Environment Services, Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland

Rob has worked with Mabbett for 17 years in Sustainability Consultancy across the U.K., Ireland and Internationally. He is the Manager of Energy and Environment Services for Mabbett across Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland. Rob predominantly supports Industry in developing, implementing and auditing Sustainability strategies with a significant focus on the Food & Drink industry in Ireland and the U.K.. This support has evolved from managing compliance, training, resource efficiency and ISO management systems to delivering complex life-cycle assessments, Scope 3 mapping, incorporating Social Sustainability and Net Zero action plans. Rob’s local team work with over 400 organisations annually across Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland sharing good practice and supporting transformation through leadership. Rob is a Full Member of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment (IEMA), Chartered Environmentalist, ESOS Lead Assessor, Certified Energy Manager and member of IEMA’s Full Member Assessor Group and assesses Chartered Environmentalist applications supporting the next generation of Sustainability leaders.

Ingrid De Doncker is an innovator in sustainable procurement and supply chain for the last 20 years. A sought-after speaker, and lecturer in three of Ireland’s universities, Ingrid is passionate about supporting business and supply chain teams to drive sustainable change to positively impact the profit, social and environmental bottom line of the business. Since 2017, she collaborates as a subject matter expert in public and private industry groups and is an evaluator of Horizon Europe projects.

As Co-founder and Head of Research and Innovation at FUTURE PLANET, she applies her deep procurement and supply chain expertise to guide companies to ‘Live, Buy, Design’ more responsibly. Future Planet is like Google Map for Sustainability. Future Planet is a software platform that guides organisations to develop their sustainability strategy, tracks, and measures ESG data, actionable transition plans, and automates compliant reporting. Future Planet won the prestigious ‘Irish Times Innovation Award’ in November 2022.

M. Sc. (Environmental Protection)

Ministerial Adviser at the Ministry of the Environment of Finland

My specialties are:

• Waste legislation, in particular, municipal solid waste, food and bio-waste and textile waste.
• Waste Management Planning in Finland
• Waste Prevention
• Circular Economy

Brian Quirke joined the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications in November 2020 and is an Assistant Principal Officer in the Department’s Circular Economy Strategic Policy Division. Brian has over 20 years’ experience in the environmental field and has worked in various roles during this time. Brian currently works on Food Waste Prevention and Green Public Procurement Policy. Brian holds a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science, a Masters in Spatial Planning and a Post Graduate Diploma in Physical Planning.