Louise 0. Fresco, Doctor Honoris Causa of the University of Montpellier

Professor Louise O. Fresco, President, Wageningen University & Research (WUR ) Louise O. Fresco combines a distinguished career as a professor at Wageningen and Amsterdam with a long-standing commitment to public policy and development, through programs in Africa, Asia and Latin America as well as numerous teaching activities in Sweden, Belgium and the USA.

Louise O. Fresco is a member of eight scientific academies and holds three Honorary Doctorates. She spent ten years as Assistant Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. She has served on the boards of companies such as Rabobank and Unilever, and is a member of the Board of Directors of Syngenta and numerous private foundations.

Her book Hamburgers in Paradise, the stories behind the food we eat (Laffont) was a great success and has been translated into several languages. She has published a total of 13 books, mostly fiction, and contributes a column to the Netherlands' leading newspaper, NRC. She has also presented a six-part documentary series on food and development on Dutch television (available on her website). She gave a TED talk in Palm Springs in 2009.

President of Wageningen University & Research (WUR ) since July 2014, Louise O. Fresco has been actively involved in developing her institution's relations with the University of Montpellier and, more broadly, with the MUSE I-SITE, of which she is a member of the MUSE International Advisory Board (MIAB). WUR was one of the first universities with which the University of Montpellier signed a framework cooperation agreement, at the initiative of the MUSE project. Louise O. Fresco also demonstrated her interest in our university at the launch of MAK'IT Montpellier Advanced Knowledge Institute on Transitions, during which she planted one of WUR's hundred UniversiTREE trees in the heart of the Jardin des Plantes at the University of Montpellier.

The title of Doctor Honoris Causa is one of the most prestigious distinctions awarded by French universities to honor "personalities of foreign nationality for eminent services rendered to science, literature or the arts, to France or to the university".