Diana Lopez is a nomad and a feminist. She is intrigued by and drawn to difference and diversity. In her work, she engages with various worldviews and methodologies to support social justice and sustainability initiatives. She is interested in the transformative potential of (embodied) gendered knowledge practices in agriculture & the environment, international development, and science.

At KIT Gender, she works on the implementation and coordination of advisory services for gender and diversity, training and capacity building on feminist analysis and gender transformative approaches, writing of policy documents, strategies, reports and peer-reviewed articles, quality assurance, portfolio assessment & MEL as well as on applied research and generation of new knowledge areas.

She is currently working on KIT’s Research Fairness Initiative, Fair Partnerships Policy, and the Knowledge Unit Gender Strategy. She is also part of the organizing committee of the CGIAR Community of Practice for Gender Transformative Methodologies, co-leading the work on Transformative Research Processes & Data.

Prior to KIT, she worked for over 10 years as a gender researcher and specialist in agri-food systems. She has a strong background in gender and intersectional analysis in rural contexts across LMICs as well as in gender transformative change in institutional settings – including programs and projects of different INGOs and other organizations, and informing on strategies.

She is proficient in Spanish, English, Portuguese, and French. She holds a BSc in International Relations & Political Economy from UDLAP (MX), an MSc in International Business & Emerging Markets from Edinburgh University (UK), and a Ph.D. in Knowledge, Technology & Innovation from Wageningen University (NL).

Publications

• Rietveld, A., Gartaula, H., Farnworth, C.R., Lopez, D.E., Bailey, A., Hellin, J., Fisher, E., …& Choudhury, A. (2022). A Community of Practice for Gender-Transformative Research Methodologies. CGIAR GENDER Impact Platform Working Paper #007. Nairobi, Kenya
• Lopez, D. E., Frelat, R., & Badstue, L. B. (2022). Towards gender-inclusive innovation: Assessing local conditions for agricultural targeting. Plos one, 17(3), e0263771.
• Bullock, B., Miriti, P. & Lopez, D.E. (2022). Participatory Rangeland Management: Understanding women’s engagement and implications for social change. Nairobi, Kenya: ILRI.
• Cummings, S. J., & Lopez, D. E. (2022). Interrogating “entrepreneurship for development”: a counter-narrative based on local stories of women in rural Ethiopia. International Journal of Gender and Entrepreneurship.
• Lopez, D. E., & Ludwig, D. (2021). A transdisciplinary perspective on gender mainstreaming in international development: the case of the CGIAR. In Ludwig, D., Boogaard, B., Macnaghten, P., & Leeuwis, C. The politics of knowledge in inclusive development and innovation. Taylor & Francis.
• Badstue, L. B., Lopez, D. E., Umantseva, A., Williams, G., Elias, M., Farnworth, C. R., … & Kandiwa, V. (2018). What drives capacity to innovate? Insights from women and men small-scale farmers in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Journal of Gender, Agriculture and Food Security. 
• Farnworth, C. R., Lopez, D. E., Badstue, L., Hailemariam, M., & Abeyo, B. G. (2018). Gender and agricultural innovation in Oromia region, Ethiopia: from innovator to tempered radical. Gender, Technology and Development, 22(3), 222-245.
• Elias, M., Mudege, N. N., Lopez, D. E., Najjar, D., Kandiwa, V., Luis, J. S., … & Bentaibi, A. (2018). Gendered aspirations and occupations among rural youth, in agriculture and beyond: A cross-regional perspective. Journal of Gender, Agriculture and Food Security.