Dr Natasha Mwila (PhD Plant Breeding and Biotechnology) is a Carnegie Corporation of New York researcher and a lecturer and mentor at the University of Zambia. She is intelligent, hardworking, and driven by the need for useful results. She is also a research expert at the Zambian Women in Agricultural Research and Development (ZaWARD) – the Zambian chapter of the AWARD fellowships. She consults for Syngenta MRI Seed Co., providing technical expertise on genetic and phenotypic purity, which has led to variety release and commercialisation. She has worked at senior level in both public (Ministry of Agriculture) and private (USAID) organisations, where improvement of rural livelihoods was promoted through the use of science-based technologies. Her research interests are in genetics; genomics; metabolomics; value addition; and sustainable, climate-smart, and nutrition-sensitive agriculture. Natasha, who grew up in a small mining town called Luanshya with little agricultural background, now owns a small farm and wants to “walk the talk”. Motivated by the view that agriculture is life, she pursued her chosen career. In her free time, she makes hair wigs and loves music, movies, football, and her beautiful family.
