Olivia Vent is one of the initiators of A Global Marketing Partnerships for SRI Indigenous Rice, one of the first five SEED Winners in 2005. A graduate of Georgetown University in Washington, DC, Olivia worked almost 20 years as a communications specialist with the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), before becoming Director of Communications at the Cornell International Institute for Food, Agriculture and Development (CIIFAD). It was there that she learned about the agroecological cultivation method called the System of Rice Intensification (SRI) and became convinced that creating value chains for small-scale rice farmers producing surpluses of traditional varieties using SRI practices would increase farmers’ incomes and preserve rice biodiversity while reducing negative environmental effects of rice production.  In 2004, she applied for a SEED Award with colleagues in CIIFAD, Cambodia, Madagascar and Sri Lanka, who together formed an informal Global SRI Marketing Partnership. Support from the Award facilitated the development of a relationship with the California-based rice-importing company, Lotus Foods.  Since 2008, she works as SRI Liaison to Lotus Foods, which today is selling throughout North America organic and fair trade certified rice grown by SRI farmers in Cambodia, Indonesia, and Madagascar, with new value chains opening in India and Thailand this fall.