Cultivating Dialogue:
U.S. & Cuban Agricultural Cooperatives
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
Abramson Family Founders Room, AU School of International Service
Speaker Biographies
Cornelius Blanding is Executive Director of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land
Assistance Fund. Prior to serving as the Federation’s Director of Marketing and International
Development, Blanding was a development project manager for nearly a decade, spearheading
special initiatives in Africa, the Caribbean, and the southern United States, including disaster relief
initiatives after Hurricane Katrina and the 2010 earthquake in Haiti. He also directed a U.S.
Department of Labor funded rural workforce development project, and headed a project with the
Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS-USDA) on conservation practices and easements
for Federation member farmers. Blanding works closely with the Federation’s Cooperative
Development Team in nationally and internationally promoting the cooperative movement. A
graduate of Stillman College in Tuscaloosa, AL, and the University of Florida in Gainesville,
Blanding serves on the National Cooperative Business Association (NCBA) board.
Carmen Diana Deere is Distinguished Professor Emerita of Latin American Studies and Food &
Resource Economics at the University of Florida, where she served as director of the Center for
Latin American Studies from 2004 to 2009. She was also named an Honorary Professor Emerita of
FLACSO-Ecuador in Quito. Deere received her PhD in agricultural economics from the University
of California, Berkeley. Her research interests include rural social movements, the politics of land
reform, feminist agricultural economics, and Cuban agrarian economics and gender. She recently coedited the volume Rural Social Movements in Latin America: Organizing for Sustainable Livelihoods
(University of Florida, 2009). Deere participates in the International Panel on Social Progress (IPSP),
and will be carrying out research in Cuba as part of the University of Florida-University of Havana
collaborative project on “The Agricultural Sector and the International Economy: Challenges and
Opportunities for Cuba and the United States.”
Garrett Graddy-Lovelace is Professor of Global Environmental Politics in the School of
International Service at American University. She received her PhD in geography from the
University of Kentucky and specializes in global environmental and agricultural policy and politics,
with particular interest in grassroots agrarian initiatives in Peru, Cuba, the U.S., and Mexico. GraddyLovelace is the author of the forthcoming book The Power of Seeds & the Politics of Agricultural
Biodiversity Conservation (International Affair Research Institute), and the forthcoming article
“Updating the Agrarian Question: The Pressures, Paradox, and Potential of US-Cuba Agricultural
Relations” (Journal of Agrarian Change). She is currently conducting original research on the World
Bank & FAO’s International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science & Technology for
Development; and is engaged in ongoing participatory research and teaching on the geopolitical
potential of Cuban agroecology movements.
Jessica Gordon Nembhard is Professor of Community Justice and Social Economic Development
in the Department of Africana Studies at the City University of New York (CUNY). She received
her PhD in economics from the University of Massachusetts and is an affiliate scholar with the
Center on Race and Wealth at Howard University and the Centre for the Study of Co-operatives at
the University of Saskatchewan in Canada. Gordon Nembhard specializes in community economics,
Black Political Economy, and popular economic literacy. Her research explores alternative solutions
in cooperative economic development and worker ownership, community economic development,
wealth inequality, and community-based approaches to justice. She recently authored the book
Collective Courage: A History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and Practice (Penn State
University, 2014).
Julie Hogeland is an agricultural economist for the United States Department of Agriculture’s
Business & Cooperative Program-Rural Development Division. She received her PhD in economics
(specializing in political economy) from American University and an MS in agricultural economics
from Michigan State University. Her research focuses on how agricultural industrialization and
globalization have modernized and transformed cooperatives’ economic practices and organizational
cultures, and on cooperative responses to uncertainty and risk. She has contributed to the edited
volumes Cooperation in Economy and Society (Rowman & Littlefield, 2010), Alternative Institutional
Structures: Evolution and Impact (Routledge, 2007), and Rethinking Capitalist Development: Essays on the
Economics of Josef Steindl (Routledge, 2005).
Mieke Meurs is Associate Dean of Graduate Studies and Professor of Economics in the College of
Arts & Sciences at American University. She received her PhD in economics from the University of
Massachusetts, Amherst. Meurs is the author of The Evolution of Agrarian Institutions (University of
Michigan, 2001), and her recent publications examine market development and social outcomes in
the transition economies of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, as well as cooperative
economics, agricultural economics, and Cuba. After receiving a Fulbright Award in 2010, she carried
out research on the behavior of healthcare non-profits in Uruguay.
Nora Ourabah Haddad is Coordinator for the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United
Nations in the Office of Partnerships, Advocacy, and Development. Previously Coordinator for
Cooperatives and Producer Organizations Partnerships, Ourabah Haddad developed several
programs based on multi-stakeholder partnerships aimed at developing the capacities of agricultural
cooperatives and producer organizations in several countries. Her main areas of expertise are
technical support for institution building, organizational analysis and development, and awarenessraising on the role of producer organizations and cooperatives for food security. Prior to joining the
FAO, Ourabah Haddad worked at the International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP);
and at a USDA-funded program, the National Center for Food and Agricultural Policies (NCFAP).
Ourabah Haddad was instrumental in the FAO Focal Point on the 2012 International Year of
Cooperatives. She holds an MBA in International Management from Laval University in Canada.
Frederick R. Royce is Program Manager for the Cooperative Agreement between the University of
Florida and the University of Havana. He received his PhD in Agricultural & Biological Engineering
from the University of Florida and specializes in sugarcane simulation models, cooperative
agricultural production systems, on-farm computer applications, and climate and agriculture. Royce
has also collaborated with several Cuban research institutions outside of the University of Havana,
including the Insituto de Investigaciones de Sanidad Vegetal (INISAV), the Instituto de
Investigaciones de la Caña de Azúcar (INICA), and the Insituto de Investigaciones en Fruticultura
Tropical (IIFT). His current research focuses on the interactions between foreign investment and
cooperative farming operations in rural Cuba, as part of the project “The Agricultural Sector and the
International Economy: Challenges and Opportunities for Cuba and the United States.”
Sara Vicari is a consultant with the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations in
the Office of Partnerships, Advocacy, and Development. She received her PhD in Development
Economics and International Development from the Università degli Studi Roma Tre in Italy, where
she continues as a Research Fellow. Her research focuses on cooperatives and their role in poverty
reduction; human development and capability approaches; and gender studies. She has done field
research in Brazil, Peru, Malawi, and India. In 2014, she won the Oxford Development Studies Sanjaya
Lall Prize for her article “To Be or Not to Be a Member of a Primary Co-Operative in Brazil: Any
Difference in Household Decision-Making and Gender Equality?”, co-authored with Francesco
Burchi.