May 19: At the Crossroads: Honoring Global Impacts Amidst Funding Challenges
Join us Monday, May 19 from 3-6pm in the International Center Multi-purpose Room to honor the impact of globally focused research at UC Davis and engage in dialogue about it’s future. While much of this work has been halted with the closure of USAID, the importance of the work and the influence it has had around the world remains unchanged. Researchers will speak to all that has been accomplished by their long-standing efforts, the lasting global impact of their work and their thoughts on ways to continue this work amidst the current funding landscape.
Short presentations by each of the investigators will be followed by a roundtable discussion with the opportunity for dialogue with the audience. The event will conclude in a reception where each of the featured research programs will have a table, inviting participants to learn more about their work and explore ways to continue it into the future.
Special guests Chancellor Gary May, Provost Mary Croughan, Vice Provost and Dean Joanna Regulska and Vice Chancellor Simon Atkinson will also be in attendance to recognize the incredible global impact of these research efforts, some spanning decades.
This event is supported by the Office of Research, Global Affairs, Grand Challenges, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, College of Letters and Science, School of Medicine, Continuing and Professional Education and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.
Speakers
A Colorful Harvest – Horticulture Innovation Lab
Erin McGuire
Director, Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Horticulture
As the director of the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Horticulture, Erin McGuire spearheads global research and partnership initiatives aimed at enhancing the livelihoods of smallholder farmers and facilitating horticulture innovations with a keen focus on nutrition and healthy diets. In this role, McGuire oversees 19 different horticultural research projects in East and West Africa, Central America and Southeast Asia, and UC Davis-based research focusing on social network analysis, postharvest management and informal market value chains. In 2023, she was the chair of all the USAID Feed the Future Innovation Labs, helping to generate discussion on the importance of horticulture and local leadership.
Innovation Lab for Markets Risk and Resilience
Tara Chiu
Associate Director, Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Markets, Risk & Resilience
Tara Chiu provides administrative and strategic support for a wide portfolio of research projects focused on poverty, food security, improved technology adoption and risk management and resilience. This includes the Index Insurance Innovation Initiative (I4). She conducts high-impact outreach to integrate research findings for more effective, evidence-based public policy and development programming. She regularly consults on index insurance implementation and scaling for national governments and NGOs.
Empowering and Innovative Designing for Protecting Nutrient Dense Food
Amanda Crump
Associate Professor, Plant Sciences
The goals of Amanda Crump’s research are to improve the uptake of agricultural technologies for marginalized groups and improve student and trainee learning through novel pedagogies. She and her team are aiming to dismantle the constant cycle of poverty that traps marginalized groups (women and girls, indigenous peoples, people living with a disability, people of lower castes, refugees, nomadic peoples and sexual minorities). To do so, they aim to understand marginalized people better, understand development program and technology adoption better and understand pedagogy better.
One Health Workforce – Next Generation
Woutrina Smith
Associate Dean, School of Veterinary Medicine Global Programs
Project Director, One Health Workforce: Next Generation Project
Woutrina Smith has been part of the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine’s One Health Institute since its inception. Smith has One Health research projects in Africa and Asia, as well as in California, where multidisciplinary teams work together to solve complex population and planetary health problems in innovative ways. Smith has received funding from diverse sources including the National Institutes of Health, the US Agency for International Development, the US Department of Defense and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to support her research and training endeavors.
From Data to Direction: Nourishing Lives through Nutrition Research
Christine Stewart
Director, Institute for Global Nutrition
Christine Stewart’s research focuses on the design and evaluation of nutrition and health interventions for women and young children in low income communities. She examines the effects of these interventions on growth, health and development throughout the life course. She utilizes primarily community-based randomized controlled trials, longitudinal studies, and meta-analyses to synthesize evidence to inform improvements in programs or policy. She collaborates extensively with multi-disciplinary and multi-national teams and has had recent projects in Kenya, Malawi, Madagascar, Bangladesh and Ecuador.
Securing Documents/Securing Futures: The UC Davis Article 26 Backpack
Keith David Watenpaugh
Professor and Director, Human Rights Studies
An American historian and theorist of human rights and humanitarianism, Keith Watenpaugh is an expert on genocide, and the role of the refugee and the forcibly displaced human in world history. He is a leader of international efforts to defend the human rights of displaced and refugee university students and scholars, primarily those affected by the wars and civil conflicts in the Middle East, South Asia and East Africa. Watenpaugh is also the founding director of the UC Davis Human Rights Studies Program, the first academic unit of its kind in the University of California system.
Centers of Excellence: Catalyst for Innovation, Economic and Social Development
Nancy Allen
Associate Director, International Programs
Nancy Allen is an organizational sociologist, currently supporting the Global Engagement Office in the College of Agricultural & Environmental Sciences at UC Davis as Associate Director for International Programs, Monitoring & Evaluation Advisor and Executive Director of the Global Fellowships in Agricultural Development (GFAD) program. She joined UC Davis in 2015, working first as UC Davis’ Chief of Party for the US-Pakistan Center for Advanced Studies in Agriculture & Food Security at the University of Agriculture Faisalabad. She has represented UC Davis on projects in Egypt, Ghana, Senegal, Bangladesh, Nepal and Kenya.
