Soumita Bhattacharya is Manager, Partnerships for Scale at the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP), where she works to build strategic partnerships for large-scale adoption of sustainable rice production. Her work focuses on aligning governments, development agencies, and private-sector actors to translate sustainability standards into practical, scalable change in the global rice sector. For her, sustainable agriculture is ultimately about expanding farmers’ choices — the choice to farm sustainably, access markets, and earn a better livelihood.
Before joining SRP, Soumita held senior technology and strategy leadership roles at AXA in Indonesia, where she led complex cross-organizational initiatives involving multiple business units and international stakeholders. This experience shaped her approach to development: applying systems thinking and stakeholder alignment while grounding sustainability initiatives in commercial realities so they can scale.
She holds a Master’s in Sustainability and a Graduate Certificate in Environmental Policy and International Development from Harvard University, and a Bachelor of Information Technology from the University of Delhi.