Annual Meeting 2004
The 40th Annual Meeting of
The Association for International Agriculture 
and Rural Development

"Progress in International Agriculture and Rural Development"
Speakers and Panelists

Julie Howard
Executive Director
Partnership to Cut Hunger and Poverty in Africa

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Julie Howard is Executive Director of the Partnership to Cut Hunger and Poverty in Africa, an independent U.S.-Africa coalition dedicated to increasing the level and effectiveness of development assistance to Africa. The Partnership focuses on investment in agriculture and rural sectors as a critical lever to expand broad-based economic growth and end African poverty and hunger in our lifetimes. Co-chairs include the Presidents of Ghana, Mali, Mozambique, Uganda, the Chair of the African Union Commission, Peter McPherson, Sen. Bob Dole and Cong. Lee Hamilton.

The Partnership played a major role in putting African agriculture and rural development "back on the agenda" of USAID, World Bank, and other bilateral and multilateral

 donors. The Partnership is actively involved in AGOA, MCA and biotechnology policy and program development, and undertakes additional policy advocacy and program activities in the U.S. and Africa in its focus areas of capacity building, agricultural markets and trade, science and technology, infrastructure, and relief to development.

Julie Howard holds a Ph.D. in agricultural economics from Michigan State University and an M.S. in International Agricultural Development from the University of California, Davis. She served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Dominican Republic 1979-82, and lived and worked in Bay Region, Somalia 1986-88 and in Zambia 1991-92. Dr. Howard serves as Assistant Professor of Development in the Department of Agricultural Economics, Michigan State University. Before joining the Partnership, she worked with the Department's Food Security project, carrying out research on agricultural technology development and transfer in Mozambique, Ethiopia, Uganda and Zambia.