معرفی
Laura T. Raynolds is a Professor of Sociology at Colorado State University and Director of the Center for Fair & Alternative Trade. She holds a Ph.D. from Cornell University and specializes in globalization, international development, food systems, gender studies, and fair trade certification. Her research focuses on socio-economic impacts of global food networks, labor rights in agro-export sectors, and gender dynamics in agricultural production.
Her work spans Latin America and the Caribbean, with extensive fieldwork in the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Mexico, Ecuador, Peru, and Costa Rica. Key research areas include certification systems' effectiveness, fair trade's role in poverty alleviation, and the intersection of gender and labor in global agro-food chains.
Raynolds has secured major grants from NSF, Ford Foundation, USAID, and MacArthur Foundation. Her 50+ publications include landmark articles like 'Re-embedding Global Agriculture' (over 900 citations) and edited volumes such as Handbook of Research on Fair Trade. She teaches courses on global food systems, gender & society, social inequality, and development theories.
Awards include John N. Stern Distinguished Professor Award (2016) and Rural Sociological Society's Excellence in Research Award (2018). Current projects examine Fairtrade labor standards in plantations, gender equity in certification processes, and socio-economic restructuring in global food sectors.
