CGIAR Research Program Directors

Victor Kommerell has been a consultant to the CGIAR since 2008, engaging with several system-wide and inter-center initiatives. Among his assignments were facilitating stakeholder conferences to develop the CGIAR Research Program on Dryland Systems, developing a sustainability plan (strategy to 2020) together with genebank managers, and supporting the external mid-term review of the Global Public Goods Project II (System-wide Genetic Resources Program).

Victor delivered a future-oriented external mid-term review for the Institutional Learning and Change Initiative (ILAC). He facilitated workshops on the future of common services for CGIAR system office units (SOUs) and quasi-SOUs, and on the future of human resources (HR) in the new CGIAR with the heads of HR of 15 CGIAR Centers.
Victor joined the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) as Program Manager of the CGIAR Research Program on Wheat in March 2012.
Victor has worked in two other international systems, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the International Criminal Court, as a multi-project and change manager. Prior to this Victor spent four years with Perot Systems as a senior people change management consultant. From 1988 to 1998 he held marketing positions with Greenpeace UK, the Leipzig Trade Fair, and a German change management consultancy.

Victor graduated from Middlebury College, Vermont, USA, the Institut d’Etudes Politiques, Paris, and New York University where he obtained an MA.