Dr. Murray McLaughlin is President of McLaughlin Consultants and an Advisor to Bioindustrial Innovation Canada (BIC). From 2010 to 2016 he was the Executive Director of BIC and the Sustainable Chemistry Alliance in Sarnia, Ontario, with a focus on a Sustainable Bioeconomy. Also through BIC he managed the AgSci Cluster, a national Bioproducts cluster supported by AAFC. Dr. McLaughlin has held various positions in the private, government and non-profit sectors such as Director of Business Development for the Canadian Light Source, President of Ontario Agri-Food Technologies, Deputy Minister of Saskatchewan Agriculture and Food, and President of Ag-West Biotech Inc. He was the founder of the ABIC conferences which started in 1996. He managed a Venture Capital Fund, Foragen, for agriculture and also spent 15 years with ELANCO, division of Eli Lily in R and D and marketing. His career has focused on bioindustrial and agricultural technologies including research, development and product management and marketing and commercialization as well as economic development and cluster building. He has been and is a member of numerous Boards of Directors and Advisory Committees, including, BioNB and FPInnovations. He co-chairs the Industrial Bioproducts Value Chain Roundtable which is a partnership between Industry and AAFC for the bioeconomy. He is a graduate of Nova Scotia Agricultural College, McGill (B. Sc. Agr.) and Cornell (MSC and PhD). He has an Honorary Doctorate Degree from Dalhousie University and has received several awards including Alumni of the Year for NSAC: LSO Community Service Award; the GoldLeaf award from BioteCanada and the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal. He was recipient of the LSO Lifetime Achievement Award in 2016 , and CIC International Award 2017 and also recognized in the top 100 global leaders in the Advanced Bioeconomy at Biofuels Digest Conference in Washington, 2016.