MARKETING PEOPLE.

Monsanto Co., St. Louis, has hired Sarah Hull as senior vice president, public affairs. Hull was most recently a senior vice president and partner at Fleishman-Hillard Inc., in Kansas City, Mo.

Ralph H. Burchfield has been named president of Firestone Agriculture Tire Co., Des Moines, Iowa. He succeeds Charles R. Ramsey, who has been appointed president of U.S. Commercial Tire group, recently created by Firestone's parent company, Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. Burchfield was previously director of sales and marketing for Firestone Ag.

Aventis CropScience, Lyon, France, announces that Gerhard Prante will leave his position as vice chairman of the company's management board. He will join the team of Horst Waesche, member of the management board of Aventis S.A. in Strasbourg and chairman of the supervisory board of Aventis CropScience. Bertrand Meheut, COO in charge of the company's core business of crop protection, has been promoted to executive vice president of Aventis CropScience.

IMC Global Inc., Lake Forest, Ill., promotes Steven J. Demetriou to executive vice president and president of crop nutrients from senior vice president of IMC Global and president of IMC Phosphates. Kermit E. McCormack is promoted to senior vice president of IMC Global and president of a new North American sales & marketing organization. McCormack had been an IMC Global vice president and president of IMC Feed Ingredients. John U. Huber, executive vice president and president of IMC Potash, will retire March 31, 2001.

ProdiGene, College Station, Texas, a supplier of plant-produced recombinant proteins for biopharmaceutical and industrial protein use, appoints Anthony G. Laos as president and CEO. Laos's past positions include group vice president of agri-products at Northrup King; vice president and general manager of Stauffer Seeds division at Stauffer Chemical; and director of market development and sales, Elanco Products Company division of Eli Lilly and Company.

DuPont Crop Protection, Wilmington, Del., hires Bart Baudler as U.S. corn / soybean business manager and promotes Troy D. Dean to U.S. soybean product manager. Previously, Baudler was U.S. segment leader for corn herbicides and soybean residual herbicides at Monsanto. Dean has been a DuPont sales representative in Florida as well as an account manager.

Accelerated Genetics, Baraboo, Wis., promotes Janet Keller to vice president of advertising and public relations. Previously, Janet was Accelerated Genetics' area director of marketing for western and southwestern Wisconsin. Accelerated Genetics hires Scott Snoderly as district sales manager in Tennessee and Angela Johnson as independent sales representative for southwest Iowa. Snoderly was previously with Blount-Greenback Farmers Cooperative Feed Mill. Johnson was employed by another AI firm as a regional services coordinator.

FMC Corp., Chicago, has elected William G. Walter executive vice president and a member of the company's board of directors. Walter was general manager of FMC's Specialty Chemicals Group, headquartered in Philadelphia, since May 1997. Walter will be responsible for all of FMC's chemicals businesses -- Specialty and Industrial Chemicals, as well as Agricultural Products. The appointment follows the Oct. 31 announcement of the proposed split of FMC into two independent publicly held companies -- machinery and chemicals. FMC says it expects Walter to become CEO of what will be the FMC chemicals business after the split.