a haroon akram-lodhi

professor of economics, global justice and development

Haroon Akram-Lodhi teaches feminist agrarian political economy. He is Professor of Economics, Global Justice and Development in the Department of Global Justice and Development at Trent University, Peterborough, Canada, where he is also a Fellow of Champlain College. Haroon Akram-Lodhi is an Associate Editor of Feminist Economics. He is also: a Professorial Research Associate in the Department of Economics at SOAS, University of London, United Kingdom; an Associated Research Professor of the Academic Unit in Development Studies at the Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas, Zacatecas, Mexico; Adjunct Professor in International Development Studies in the Faculty of Graduate Studies at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada; Adjunct Member to the Graduate Program in Political Science at York University in Toronto, Canada; Adjunct Professor of Economics in the Master's in Development Practice program at the James T. Laney School of Graduate Studies, Emory University, Atlanta, USA; and a Visiting Scholar in that School's Institute for Developing Nations. Previously, Haroon Akram-Lodhi has been: a fellow of Food First, the Institute for Food and Development Policy;  the Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Journal of Development Studies; a member of the Advisory Board for the Women's Rights Programme of the Open Society Foundations in New York City; a member of the Board of Directors of the International Association for Feminist Economics; and a member of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Association for the Study of International Development. 

Trained as an economist, the focus of Haroon Akram-Lodhi's research interest is on the engendered political economy of agrarian change in the countries of the global South, on the economic dimensions of gender relations, and on the political ecology of gendered sustainable rural livelihoods in contemporary low- and middle-income countries. This is reflected in the teaching he does, on global human inequality, on the future of smallholder peasant communities in the world food system, on the sustainability of rural social structures, relations and institutions, and on gender and economic policy.  He currently acts as a Gender and Livelihoods Advisor to the United Nations Capital Development Fund, a Poverty and Gender Analyst for the United Nations Environment Programme's Poverty - Environment Action, and as a Gender and Women's Empowerment Adviser to UN Women. For many years he acted as a Gender and Poverty Advisor to the United Nations Development Programme's Gender Team, based in New York City. Haroon Akram-Lodhi has lived, taught, and conducted research in numerous countries, published extensively in peer-reviewed journals, and has undertaken advisory services for a wide variety of multilateral, bilateral and non-governmental international development organizations.

In 2015 Haroon Akram-Lodhi received Trent University's Distinguished Research Award. He has received a Merit Award for Research from Trent University in 2008, 2010 and 2013 and 2018.

In June 2022 Haroon Akram-Lodhi gave a talk to the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Vienna on the impact of the war in Ukraine on the world food system:

Haroon Akram-Lodhi's most recent book, co-edited with Kristina Dietz, Bettina Engels and Ben M. McKay, is the Handbook of Critical Agrarian Studies.

The Handbook offers interdisciplinary insights from both leading scholars and activists to understand agrarian life, livelihoods, formations and processes of change. An ambitious undertaking, its 72 chapters highlight the development of the field of critical agrarian studies, which is characterized by theoretical and methodological pluralism and innovation. Furthermore, the Handbook presents critical analyses of, and examines controversies about, historical and contemporary social structures and processes in agrarian and rural settings from a wide range of perspectives.

In May 2022 Haroon Akram-Lodhi delivered a keynote address on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the Rural Sociology Group at Wageningen University entitled "From peasant studies to critical agrarian studies. Click on the link below to watch the keynote in full:

Follow Haroon Akram-Lodhi on Twitter: @AHAkramLodhi.