A General Engineer of Bridges, Waters, and Forests, a member of the Academy of Technologies and the Academy of Agriculture of France, François HOULLIER has been the CEO of Ifremer (French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea) since September 19, 2018. With a Habilitation to Supervise Research and a Ph.D. from Claude Bernard University (Lyon I), he is a former student of the Ecole Polytechnique and the Ecole Nationale du Génie Rural, des Eaux et Forêts (Engref, now AgroParisTech). He conducted research on forest inventories and later on forest and plant modeling.
From September 2016 to September 2018, he served as the temporary administrator and then the president of Sorbonne Paris Cité University (USPC), a community of universities and institutions that included Sorbonne Nouvelle University, Paris Descartes University, Paris Diderot University, Paris 13 University, as well as Sciences Po, the Institute of Physique du Globe de Paris (IPGP), the National Institute of Oriental Languages and Civilizations (Inalco), the School of Public Health (EHESP), and the Foundation Maison des Sciences de l’Homme (FMSH). As the president of USPC, he led the “Université de Paris” excellence initiative, selected in March 2018 under the Investissements d’avenir program.
From July 2012 to July 2016, he was the CEO of the National Institute for Agronomic Research (INRA), where he held various positions, including head of the “Forests and Natural Environments” department and the “Ecology of Forests, Meadows, and Aquatic Environments” department. He also served as the Deputy Director-General in charge of organization, resources, and scientific evaluation. He had previously established the Evaluation Unit of the National Forest Inventory in Montpellier (1986-88), created and led the research team “Dynamics of Forest Systems” at Engref and INRA in Nancy (1988-94), directed the French Institute of Pondicherry in India (1994-97), and the joint research unit “Botany and Bioinformatics of Plant Architecture” (UMR AMAP) in Montpellier (1998-2002).
He has held several other leadership positions, including chairing the boards of the European Forest Institute (2004-06) and the Public Interest Group “Ecosystems Forestiers” (GIP ECOFOR, 2008-12). He also chaired the Scientific Interest Group “Green Biotechnologies” (2010-2013) and, from March 2012 to July 2016, the board of AllEnvi, the national research alliance for the environment. In 2015 and 2016, he submitted two reports to the French government on research and innovation in the fields of agriculture and the forest-wood sector. He also delivered a report on participatory sciences in France to the ministers responsible for education, higher education, and research in February 2016. As a result of this report, a national charter was developed and signed on March 20, 2017.
Since September 2018, François HOULLIER has been the CEO of IFREMER, the French research institute dedicated to marine sciences and technologies. IFREMER operates the French oceanographic fleet for the benefit of the entire scientific community.
