🇬🇹Rolling the Dice on the Dinner Plate: The Development of Agriculture Financialization in Guatemala. 🇬🇹

Since when did grocery stores in Global North start selling mortgages, credit cards & loyalty programs?  For Dr. Ryan Isakson, it's a telling example of how financialization, meaning how corporations increase their influence in our lives, is ever increasing.  So too, is it occurring in the Global South, even with small-scale farmers in rural Guatemala.  In this podcast, Ryan Isakson talks about the risks of financialization and how it is playing out in rural Guatemala.

Ryan Isakson holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.  Broadly, he is interested in the political economy of international development, with specific focus upon agriculture, rural livelihoods, and food provisioning in Latin America.  He has conducted research on market development, peasant livelihoods, and the cultivation of agricultural biodiversity; market-led land reform; agri-food certification; payments for environmental services; and the contemporary ‘flex crops’ boom.  His current foci are (1) farmer vulnerability and the financialization of agri-food provisioning, and (2) the impacts of oil palm expansion upon food entitlements and water quality in northern Guatemala.  He teaches three courses for the International Development Studies program: (1) The Political Economy of International Development (IDSB01), (2) The Economics of Small-Enterprise and Microfinance, and (3) The Political Economy of Food.

His latest book with Jennifer Clapp is titled Speculative Harvests: Financialization, Food & Agriculture.

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