Ida Westphal is a lawyer with a focus on Agricultural and Environmental Law. She gained professional experience, amongst others, at the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture and as a researcher in the field of environmental policy at Öko-Institut e.V. Ida studied and worked in Berlin, Potsdam, Paris and Cape Town. During her legal training, she also studied Agricultural Science in Berlin and worked as an intern to a Togolese NGO in the field of agriculture. As a Mercator Fellow, Ida will focus on possibilities for alternative licensing models in the seed sector based on the open source concept to counter negative ramifications of patents on seeds.