Dr Blaž Germšek, born on 24 April 1984 in Ptuj, graduated from the Faculty of Agriculture and Life Sciences at the University of Maribor, where he also obtained his PhD in 2017. He is one of the leading experts on new technologies and digitalisation in agriculture and a strong advocate of modern technologies in agriculture.

Already during his studies, he gained experience in various areas of agriculture. He started his career as agricultural advisor at the Maribor Agriculture and Forestry Institute, continued his career in the business sector and recently worked at the Agricultural Institute of Slovenia as the head of the largest unit for infrastructure, research and knowledge transfer. He is also an external partner of the Faculty of Agriculture and Life Sciences of the University of Maribor in the area of greenhouse technologies at the Department of Life Sciences.

He is the author of numerous scientific publications, papers and studies in the area of modern agriculture and new technologies. He has furthered his knowledge on vertical farming in Japan and has regularly participated in international conferences and trade fairs for modern agricultural technologies, robotics and digitalisation. He has been raising awareness about modern approaches in agriculture on his blog since 2013.

He took office as State Secretary on 23 October 2023.