Hans Sauter has served as Fresh Del Monte’s Chief Sustainability Officer and Senior Vice President, Corporate R&D, QA, and Agricultural Services since 2020 and 2019, respectively. Prior to that time, he served as Fresh Del Monte’s Vice President of Corporate R&D and Agricultural Services from February 2014 to February 2019. Sauter served as Director, Agricultural Services and New Development from 1998 to 2012, when he was named Vice President, Agricultural Services & Special Projects for the Colombia, Ecuador, Central America and Brazil (CECAB) region. 

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John: Welcome to another edition of the Impact Podcast. I’m John Shegerian, and I’m so honored to have with us today Hans Sauter. He’s the Senior Vice President, R&D, Agricultural Services, and Chief Sustainability Officer for Fresh Del Monte. Hans, welcome to the Impact Podcast.

Hans Sauter: Thank you, John. It’s a pleasure to be here.

John: We have a lot to talk about today, about all the great work you’re doing in sustainability and Ag and R&D over at Fresh Del Monte, but before we get into that, I’d like you to share a little bit about your background. Where were you born? Where did you grow up? How you got on this fascinating and important journey that you’re on?

Hans: I was born in Costa Rica, and I feel privileged for having grown in a biological hotspot where I was always exposed to this huge diversity of nature. From very young, I was totally in love with our landscape. Even though I grew up in the city, I wanted to be, desperately wanted to be in the countryside. So I decided to go for agriculture. For my grad studies, I went to California to do my work in entomology, in biological control, which was the way I felt I could contribute to making agriculture more compatible with nature. I’m now, after a whole life of working in agriculture and leading many programs, I have the privilege of influencing a big company like ours towards these new, more nature-positive outcomes.

John: When you got out of grad school, what was your first job out of grad school?

Hans: I worked in Costa Rica at the University of Costa Rica. Not very long after that, however, I got tempted to go into the research department of Fresh Del Monte, precisely on the banana operation there in Costa Rica. There, I started doing some work on biological control.

John: I don’t want to go into everything about Fresh Del Monte yet. So you tell me what your beautiful background is behind you there.

Hans: That’s a pineapple farm, Fresh Del Monte, in the southern part of Costa Rica.

John: I can see why it’s kind of easy to get up every morning and go to work if you’re going to go to work somewhere as beautiful as that. That is just beautiful. So you first worked your way up at Fresh Del Monte as in R&D in the Ag Services Department before you became Chief Sustainability Officer. Is that correct?

Hans: Correct. I worked for 25 years in Costa Rica, first in bananas, as I was saying, and then leading the R&D programs in pineapples, where we launched a new, totally different variety of pineapples. At that time, pineapples in the major markets were mostly green and very acid, and we decided to innovate and bring in a sweeter yellow variety that totally took the market by surprise and in a matter of four years was the dominant variety, which is what you find nowadays in every retailer, every supermarket. It’s called MD2. It’s our Fresh Del Monte Gold variety.

John: Just for our listeners and viewers, just so we understand who Fresh Del Monte is, first of all, find Hans and all of his colleagues at Fresh Del Monte. You can go to www.freshdelmonte.com. Fresh Del Monte is one of the world’s largest vertically integrated producers and distributors and marketers of fresh-cut fruits and vegetables. So you do over $4 billion in sales a year. You have almost 50,000 employees, and your products are sold in over 80 countries. This is a big organization that you’re the Chief Sustainability Officer of.

Hans: Yes, indeed. It’s a very large and widespread organization.

John: So you and I know, Hans, that sustainability now, there’s an alphabet soup of issues that are talked about. Of course, ESG is one of them, and diversity inclusivity is another. Then there’s also you have the issue of the shift from the linear to the circular economy. How wide or narrow is sustainability read at Del Monte in terms of your day-to-day, week-to-week, month-to-month, quarter-to-quarter, year-to-year? Is it a wide reading of sustainability? Is it a narrow reading? How would you define what your role is in sustainability at Fresh Del Monte?

Hans: It’s a very wide role, incredibly wide. Every day, it becomes larger because new issues are being brought up, and our awareness of impact is higher. We have a very large global footprint. One of the most exciting things about the role is that with all the responsibility that it carries, it also brings the opportunity to influence a large amount of people and significant operations around the world. It’s amazing how many people actually can suddenly start sharing passion for conservation if you make it part of your DNA.

John: Was there a chief sustainability officer prior to you taking that role?

Hans: No.

John: So you’re the first?

Hans: Yes.

John: I love that. I love when I get to interview great people like you that are walking into that proverbial blank page. How did you even start that journey? You’re already at Fresh Del Monte, so you already knew the DNA of the company. But now you have that blank page of chief sustainability officer. Where do you start the journey and put one foot in front of the other? What issues do you decide to work on first? And what do you put off as longer term issues?

Hans: The one advantage I had was the background of having worked with operations initially and understanding the farming reality. Many of the significant issues with sustainability in agriculture start at the primary production stage. That’s where the impact on soil, nature, deforestation, erosion, but even on communities can happen. So having been there and having worked intimately with those operations, I had good knowledge of what could be done and what could be leveraged. There was so much good that we were doing already. In this picture on my background, you can see the huge conservation areas that are intermingled in our farms. That’s not a coincidence. It was a decision that we made early on, not to farm land that had more than a slope that would put at risk soil and not to farm soil that was not necessarily optimal for the crop, but to actually, in recognition of the ecosystem services that we needed from the landscape, preserve some of it for water or erosion control or pollination or so many other aspects that normally are not well documented, but these operations vitally depend on. With that kind of knowledge, I started building from the ground. It was a win-win situation for the organization. There was immediate understanding of how this could be built into a larger role. Here we are.

John: Climate change and consumption. Talk a little bit about those two competing factors. What is the effect on climate change and many of your core products that you deliver to around the world? Is there a rising consumption? Let’s just take two of your products, pineapples and bananas. Is there a rising consumption and then a worry that climate change is eroding the production opportunities for these great products that you produce for the 80 or so countries around the world?

Hans: Yes. As with many other crops, climate change is definitely having an impact as we speak. Our operations rely heavily on research teams and technical expertise. So we are compensating to make sure that those impacts are lessened. But no question, the conditions are becoming tougher and require more inputs to be able to provide the same amount of food.

John: Let’s talk a little bit about their tropical race for TR4. What does that mean with regards to the banana industry and the impact that climate change is having on it? What does that mean at Fresh Del Monte TR4?

Hans: We have a direct exposure to TR4 in our operations in the Philippines. That has given us the opportunity to learn about the disease firsthand. It’s nothing you can take lightly. It has demonstrated a remarkable ability to spread across continents. It has made it to the Americas already. Both Colombia, Venezuela, and Peru have already officially declared that they have TR4. They’re trying to keep it under control. However, without an effective treatment, this disease remains in the soil for decades. Farms literally become unsustainable after a few years.

John: What exactly is it, Hans?

Hans: It’s a fungus. It’s a fungus that is resilient to very tough conditions and can survive in the soil in the form of spores, even without cultivation of the crop.

John: How is Fresh Del Monte taking steps to mitigate this disease and to ensure the supply of bananas now and in the future?

Hans: We’re not taking it lightly. We have invested in developing, collaborating with other organizations to come up with a resistant variety. We have already made arrangements to have exclusive rights over a variety that was developed by the Queensland University of Technology. That’s a first step in the process. We will be testing that variety in the Philippines in the near future. Of course, we’ll have to build on top of that.

John: When it comes to pineapples, talk a little bit about pineapples and innovation, just like you’re innovating with bananas. How does pineapple innovation also keep you ahead of the challenges that all producers and all farmers around the world are facing today because of climate change and because of funguses and other crises?

Hans: Yes, pineapples are our flagship product. We have commanded the leadership of that market already for decades. We feel especially proud and privileged of having the know-how to be able to address evolving consumer preferences. We have innovated the sector already several times, not only with that Del Monte gold variety that was released 25 years ago, but we did it again four years ago with the Pinklo. It’s a pink pineapple. It’s a GMO that was bioengineered to accumulate lycopene. In the process, address consumer interest for innovation. It’s been a tremendous success. We continue building on those successful stories. Like now we’re releasing the Ruby Glow, which is a red pineapple. This was developed with traditional breeding techniques by moving pollen to the flower. It took a long time, but it’s addressing another sector of the market. The Honey Glow and the Precious Honey Glow, which are basically twists on the way we produce at the farm. So overall, we feel like the baker and the brewer that have this craftsmanship. That’s part of our passion.

John: When will we be able to buy pink or red pineapples? I’m interested now that you said that. I’m very interested. I love your regular pineapples. I’m now interested in your pink and your red pineapples.

Hans: You can get the Pinklo in the United States. You would need to go to our website to find out specifically in what location in California. But it’s available. You can even order it via e-commerce.

John: That’s just wonderful. For our listeners and viewers who’ve just joined us, we’ve got Hans Sauter with us today. He’s the Senior Vice President, R&D and Agricultural Services and Chief Sustainability Officer at Fresh Del Monte. To find Hans and all his great colleagues and all the important work they’re doing in sustainability at Fresh Del Monte, please go to www.freshdelmonte.com. Hans, every year you put out a sustainability report?

Hans: Yes.

John: That lives in perpetuity on the Fresh Del Monte website?

Hans: Yes. You can find all of the ones we have published for the last five years.

John: So you’ve been in the position now coming on about five years. Talk a little bit about some of your favorite, one or two of your favorite wins the last five years. What are you looking forward towards most in the next five years ahead?

Hans: We’re very proud of our success in reducing greenhouse gas emissions from our supply chain. We initially committed to the science-based targets initiative, and with a target of reducing 27.5% of our scope one and scope two emissions, we are proud to report that we were just about to reach that goal. You can read about that in our last year’s report. But this year will bring some more good news.

John: Regenerative agriculture, that’s a buzz terminology in the agricultural world. How much do you leverage regenerative agriculture to help you with your continued needs of ongoing good crops to fuel the demand that you have for your great products?

Hans: As a scientist, my approach to sustainability is always based on the facts. Bringing regenerative agriculture to tropical crops takes definitely a lot of scientific research. Temperate crops, row crops have benefited from years and years of university research in northern regions. Tropical crops have not received that benefit. So as we speak, we’re engaging in multiple projects to demonstrate to our own operations and farmers those benefits in bananas and pineapples. Anything from covered crops, addition of compost and soil health, the best way of moving sustainability forward is always on facts. If we can demonstrate that there is a win-win on a particular agricultural practices, growers will take up those practices.

John: AI is the new buzzword in technology. How much do you lean on technology to do predictive analytics on climate in the areas that you grow your crops around the world? Is it going to be a part of the future of good agricultural practice and procedure when it comes to sustainable farming?

Hans: As in every other field, there is a place for AI, no question. There is so many decisions to be taken in an agricultural setting at the farm level. Probably one of the most difficult roles for a farm manager is decision making. It used to be based on standard operational procedures. But now that we’re trying to be more precise, go to the acre or even square foot level to save on inputs and to reduce impact. Those decisions become more relevant, but also need to be taken timely. They cannot be postmortem decisions. So I definitely see a place for AI to help sort out irrelevant information and flag the information that really requires the manager’s attention and a decision on it.

John: Hans, you’re sitting, like you said, at a very large company with 80 countries or more that you serve, over 49,000 employees and billions in revenue. When you look to benchmark your sustainability efforts, do you look to just your counterparts within your industry and your competitors? Or do you look outside of your industry for inspiration and aspiration?

Hans: All over. The challenges that we’re facing go beyond our industry. Sometimes we’re having to break new ground. It’s also part of our vision to lead the industry towards a transition that has more nature-positive outcomes. That requires conversations with people from every walk and from different sectors.

John: You’re obviously a global citizen. You grew up in Costa Rica. You now live in the United States. You have operations around the world. How much of your time is spent in office in the United States? How much of your time is spent literally on the farms and checking in with your operations around the world? How much of your time do you have to spend on the road?

Hans: Half and half. Only because nowadays we have the luxury of communicating this way, where we can see and feel, especially if you have been in the operations so much time before. But, yes, it’s always on the road.

John: Nothing really beats in-person contact and eyeballing it in person, does it?

Hans: No.

John: Listen, your journey, as you and I know, sustainability doesn’t have a finish line. It’s a journey. I just want to thank you for your time today, sharing some of your thoughts and wisdom and all the great work that you’re doing at Fresh Del Monte in sustainability. I want you to know you’re always invited back on the Impact Podcast. For our listeners and viewers to find Hans and his colleagues at Fresh Del Monte, please go to www.freshdelmonte.com. You are the gold standard of goodness, Hans. Thank you and all your colleagues at Fresh Del Monte for making the world a better place.

Hans: Thank you, John. Pleasure talking to you.

John: This edition of the Impact Podcast is brought to you by Engage. Engage is a digital booking platform revolutionizing the talent booking industry. With thousands of athletes, celebrities, entrepreneurs, and business leaders, Engage is the go-to spot for booking talent for speeches, custom experiences, live streams, and much more. For more information on Engage or to book talent today, visit letsengage.com. This edition of the Impact Podcast is brought to you by ERI. ERI has a mission to protect people, the planet, and your privacy, and is the largest fully integrated IT and electronics asset disposition provider and cybersecurity-focused hardware destruction company in the United States and maybe even the world. For more information on how ERI can help your business properly dispose of outdated electronic hardware devices, please visit eridirect.com.