BINA AGARWAL is Professor of Development Economics and Environment at the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester, UK. Prior to this, she was Director and Professor of Economics at the Institute of Economic Growth, Delhi University. Educated at the Universities of Cambridge and Delhi, she has held distinguished teaching and research positions at many universities, including Harvard, Princeton, Michigan, Minnesota, and the New York University School of Law. In 2017 she also received the Agropolis Louis Malassis (Montpellier) International Scientific Prize for an ‘Outstanding Career in Agricultural Development’ from the Agropolis Fondation, Montpellier.
Other honors that Agarwal has received include the 2002 Malcolm Adiseshiah award for ‘Distinguished Contributions to Development Studies’; the 2005 the Ramesh Chandra award for ‘Outstanding Contributions to Agricultural Economics’. and the 2010 Leontief Prize from Tufts University ‘for advancing the frontiers of economic thought.’ In 2008, Agarwal was also awarded a Padma Shri by the President of India.
Agarwal’s research contributions cover both theory and empirical analysis, with a particular focus on the most disadvantaged. An economist with a keen interest in interdisciplinary and intercountry explorations, her publications include 12 books and 84 academic papers. She writes especially from a political economy and gender perspective on diverse but interconnected subjects. Her subsequent work, Gender and Green Governance (Oxford University Press 2010), explores the impact of women’s presence on forest governance and conservation, empirically demonstrating positive outcomes on both counts. In 2016, Oxford University Press also published a three volume compendium of her selected papers, entitled Gender Challenges.
An original thinker and policy advocate, Agarwal brings to her work insights from both theory and field experience. In 2005, she spearheaded a successful campaign for the comprehensive amendment of the Hindu Inheritance law in India to make it gender equal. She also writes on policy matters for India’s leading newspapers.
Agarwal has been President of the International Society for Ecological Economics, Vice-President of the International Economic Association, and President of the International Association for Feminist Economics. She has served on the Boards of many international organisations, including the Global Development Network, UNRISD (Geneva), the UN Committee for Development Policy (New York), and the Future Earth Science Committee. She is currently is a member of International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES-Food), and on the editorial boards of many academic journals. She was also a member of the Stigliz Commission for the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress set up by President Sarkozy. In 2016 Agarwal was elected an international member of the prestigious Accademia dei Lincei, Italy, Europe’s oldest academy of science. She also holds honorary doctorates from the Institute of Social Studies in the Netherlands and the University of Antwerp in Belgium.