After his chemistry studies, Dr. Derra became head of laboratory of the ISEGA Forschungs- und Untersuchungsgesellschaft mbH, Aschaffenburg. Since 1986, he has been president of this company. As an authorized state registered expert for the analyses of packaging materials and of soil and air, he attends to the field of certification of materials in contact with foodstuffs. Apart from the analysis and evaluation of foodstuffs packages, environmental effects like re-cycling and composting are main focal points of his work.
Within the new German National Accreditation Body DAkkS, he represents the German Chem-ical Society GDCh in the fields of chemistry and protection of consumer health.
Dr. Derra is chairman of the analytical DIN committees on paper as well as on plastics in food contact and, in this function he also represents the German standardization in the correspond-ing European CEN workgroups. Since 2015, he is Chairman of the CEN/TC 172 Pulp, Paper and Board.