Plant Health Scientist – Field & Lab Diagnostics

Bayer; Brakpan; Presencial; ZAR 700.000 - 900.000; Tempo integral

Resumo da vaga

Bayer Plant Health Scientist I role in Petit, South Africa, supports Breeding’s Plant Health strategy through disease phenotyping, inoculum production, and field trials across lab, greenhouse, and field. The role emphasizes translating pathology observations into actionable breeding decisions, with regional travel and strong collaboration across research, breeding, and commercial teams.

Requires PhD or MSc in Plant Pathology and minimum 3 years of applied pathology experience; English

Qualificações

• PhD or MSc in Plant Pathology or related discipline with minimum 3 years applied pathology experience.
• Strong expertise in field pathology, plant disease characterization, inoculum production, disease diagnostics, and applied disease-screening programs.
• Ability to lead technical activities independently, troubleshoot operational issues, make sound recommendations, and influence cross-functional stakeholders without direct authority.
• Strong communication, stakeholder-management, and capability-building skills across field, research, breeding, and commercial interfaces.

Responsabilidades

• Execute Plant Health field characterization across target environments, ensuring robust disease observations, phenotyping quality, and interpretation of disease pressure relevant to breeding decisions.
• Support inoculum production workflows, including pathogen sourcing, multiplication, quality control, readiness planning, and alignment with biosafety, phytosanitary, and protocol standards.
• Provide technical support for disease diagnosis, including symptom assessment, sample evaluation, pathogen identification, differential diagnosis, and escalation of complex Plant Health cases requiring specialist pathology input.
• Co-design, implement, optimize, and standardize disease-screening protocols and tools to strengthen consistency, reproducibility, and decision value across regional testing networks.
• Build regional Plant Health capability by coaching field teams, improving disease assessment discipline, and embedding fit-for-purpose pathology practices across locations.
• Translate field pathology outputs into actionable technical insights for Breeding, Ag X, commercial, and regional stakeholders, enabling timely and evidence-based product decisions.
• Ensure all staff working in the lab or fields are properly trained and compliant with the Bayer ESH policies to ensure safe operations of the research program.
• Drive continuous improvement in data quality, protocol governance, diagnostic reliability, technical documentation, and operational efficiency.
• Regional travel is required.

Conhecimentos

Plant pathology expertise

Field pathology

Inoculum production

Disease diagnostics

Leadership without authority

Stakeholder management

English proficiency

Formação

PhD or MSc in Plant Pathology

Descrição da vaga

Bayer Plant Health Scientist I role in Petit, South Africa, supports Breeding’s Plant Health strategy through disease phenotyping, inoculum production, and field trials across lab, greenhouse, and field. The role emphasizes translating pathology observations into actionable breeding decisions, with regional travel and strong collaboration across research, breeding, and commercial teams.

Requires PhD or MSc in Plant Pathology and minimum 3 years of applied pathology experience; English