Karen Hansen-Kuhn

Karen Hansen-Kuhn is program director at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP). She leads IATP’s work on trade policy and ensures synergies among our programs on trade, farm systems and climate and economic justice. She has published articles on U.S. trade and agriculture policies and their impacts on food security, rural livelihoods and the climate crisis. She was the international coordinator of the Alliance for Responsible Trade (ART), a U.S. multisectoral coalition promoting just and sustainable trade. In that role and in her work as chair of the monitoring team for the Hemispheric Social Alliance, she brought partners from many sectors and countries together to analyze the impacts of trade proposals and to propose alternative solutions. She continues to research and advocate for alternative trade rules for agriculture, new measures to support a transition to agroecology and efforts to find common ground among farmers and consumers in the Global South and North.

She was previously policy director at the U.S. office of ActionAid, an international development organization, focusing especially on advancing the right to food and women’s rights in trade and development programs. She holds a Bachelor of Science in International Business from the University of Colorado and a master’s degree in International Development from The American University.