Eri Hayashi

President, Japan Plant Factory Association

Eri serves as president of the Japan Plant Factory Association (JPFA), a nonprofit organization devoted to academic and business advancements in plant factory/controlled environment agriculture (CEA). Before joining the JPFA, Eri worked at a private research institute in Tokyo, specializing in technology advancement for global food production. She has been conducting international field research on plant factories/CEA since 2008. She has published multiple research papers and has been a research project manager on artificial intelligence and phenotyping-based next-generation plant factory for environmental control and breeding. She has a keen interest in technological advances, including phenotyping, in plant factories. She received a Ph.D. from the Graduate School of Horticulture, Chiba University.