Raj PATEL, Ph.D.

Raj Patel is a writer, activist and academic, currently a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley’s Center for African Studies, a researcher at the School of Development Studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and a fellow at The Institute for Food and Development Policy, also known as Food First. He has degrees from the University of Oxford, the London School of Economics and Cornell University.

He was recently invited to share his views on the global food crisis in testimony to the US House Financial Services Committee. He regularly writes for The Guardian, and has contributed to the LA Times, NYTimes.com, The San Francisco Chronicle and The Observer. He works in support of the international farmer, farmworkers and landless worker movement, La Via Campesina. His first book is Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System.

Jo SWINNEN

Prof. Jo Swinnen is currently Professor of Development Economics and Director of the LICOS-Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance at the University of Leuven (KUL). He is a senior research fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), Brussels, and on the Programme Committee of the International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium (IATRC). He was previously lead economist at the World Bank and economic advisor at the European Commission.

He also consults for the OECD, FAO, EBRD, UNDP, IFAD, and to several Governments. He further acts as coordinator of several European research networks and projects on food policy, institutional reforms, transition, political economy, globalization and agricultural trade.

His latest books are “Global Supply Chains, Standards, and the Poor”, “Distortions to Agricultural Incentives in the Transition Economies of Europe and Central Asia”, “The Political Economy of the Reform of the Common Agricultural Policy”, and “From Marx and Mao to the Market”. He is a fellow of the European Association of Agricultural Economists and holds a Ph.D from Cornell University.

Smita NARULA

Faculty Director, Center for Human Rights & Global JusticeProf. Smita Narula is the Faculty Director of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at New York University School of Law, and Associate Professor of Clinical Law of the International Human Rights Clinic.

Both her scholarship and clinical work focus on key human rights issues including: discrimination on the basis of caste, race, religion, and gender; human rights abuses in the “war on terror”; economic and social rights; and the impact of corporations and other business enterprises on human rights.

Her June 2006 article in the Columbia Journal of Transnational Law, titled The Right to Food: Holding Global Actors Accountable Under International Law, looks at the need to close accountability gaps for human rights abuses arising out of corporate conduct and international financial institution monetary arrangements. Before joining NYU in August 2003, Narula spent six years at Human Rights Watch, first as the organization’s India researcher and later as Senior Researcher for South Asia. She is a recognized expert on caste discrimination.

Sanjay REDDY

Sanjay G. Reddy is Assistant Professor of Economics at Columbia University where he teaches at Barnard College and in the School of International and Public Affairs. His areas of work include development economics, international economics and economics and philosophy. He possesses a Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University, an M.Phil. in Social Anthropology from the University of Cambridge, and an A.B. in Applied Mathematics with Physics from Harvard University.

He has held fellowships from the Center for Ethics and the Professions and the Center for Population and Development Studies at Harvard University and the Center for Human Values at Princeton University. He has conducted extensive research for development agencies and international institutions, including the ILO, Oxfam, UN-DESA (Department of Economic and Social Affairs, UN Secretariat), UNICEF, UNDP, UNU-WIDER (World Institute for Development Economics Research), the World Bank, the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Institute. He has been a member of the "advisory panel of eminent experts" of the UNDP's Human Development Report, and of the UN Statistics Division's Steering Committee on Poverty Statistics.

He is a member of the editorial advisory boards of Development, Ethics and International Affairs, the European Journal of Development Research and the Review of Income and Wealth. He is a citizen of India.

Judi Wangalwa WAKHUNGU, Ph.D.

Prof. Wakhungu is the Executive Director of the African Centre for Technology Studies (ACTS) in Nairobi, Kenya. ACTS is a Nairobi-based international inter-governmental science, technology, and environmental policy think tank that generates and disseminates new knowledge through policy analysis, capacity building, and outreach.

Prof. Wakhungu’s research interests include science, technology, and innovation; agriculture and food security; biodiversity and natural resource management; energy and water security; and gender issues in science and technology. She has published widely in these fields. Prof. Wakhungu serves on several national and international boards, task-forces, and committees. These include the African Conservation Centre (ACC), High-Level Consultative Group (United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) –Global Environmental Outlook (GEO-4), the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), the GoDown Arts Centre, the Institute for Security Studies (ISS), the Lemelson Foundation, Scientists Without Borders, the STEPS Centre – University of Sussex, the Sustainable Agriculture Centre for Research Extension and Development (SACRED) in Africa, and the World Bioenergy Association.