Gianna Bonis-Profumo

Gianna Bonis-Profumo is a social sciences researcher and development practitioner. She is passionate about food security and nutrition issues, specifically those affecting women, Indigenous populations and smallholder farmers. Her PhD explores women´s empowerment in agriculture and children’s diets in rural Timor-Leste. As most food insecure people around the world are smallholders, she investigates the pathways by which agriculture programmes and livelihoods can sustainably support nutrition outcomes among rural populations. Her research interests are cross-disciplinary with a focus on food access and diets, on how gender relations intersect with these in development contexts, and on policies for healthy, sustainable and equitable food systems. While based in Timor-Leste for 3 years, she worked in multiple technical reports including a Strategic Review of the SDG2 and an Agriculture Sector Review with Professor Jessica Fanzo from Johns Hopkins University, and led a formative research study on adolescents’ nutrition for Social Behaviour Change. Publications include a book chapter on food security, nutrition and climate change interrelations in Timor-Leste. She holds a MA in Development Studies in anthropology and a BA in Political Sciences. Gianna has worked in Australia and Southeast Asia for over a decade, grew up in Barcelona and has Italian heritage.