Emmanuel Faber started his career with Bain & Company in 1986. After working for an investment bank and Legris Industries, he joined Danone in 1997, as head of Corporate Development and Strategy. He was appointed CFO and then Executive Vice President of the Asia-Pacific region. In October 2014, he became the CEO of Danone, succeeding Franck Riboud.
Emmanuel has been integral to propelling the notion of social business within Danone. He initiated the social business joint venture Grameen-Danone Foods, Ltd in Bangladesh with Nobel Prize winner Mohammed Yunus and oversaw the creation of danone.communities, the first French mutual investment fund revolving around social business. He has championed Danone’s involvement as a key investor in both the Livelihoods Carbon Fund and the Livelihoods Fund for Family Farming (Livelihoods 3F)- dedicated to greening supply chains- as ways to restore and protect natural ecosystems vital to Danone’s business. This is in line with the company’s philosophy that healthy food springs from a healthy environment.
Faber co-chairs with Martin Hirsch the think tank “Business and Poverty”- a social experimentation lab initiated in 2010 by the university HEC Paris, which gathers companies, civil society organizations and academic spheres together with one common objective: contribute to reducing poverty and exclusion in France.
In 2013, at the request of the French Minister of Development, Pascal Canfin, he wrote a report with Jay Naidoo on reforming Official Development Assistance: “Mobilizing actors: a new approach to development aid”. He published in 2011 a book, “Chemins de Traverse”, explaining how he thinks that business and social impact can be merged through social businesses.
