Christine Lamanna

Christine Lamanna is a researcher in sustainable agricultural development, specializing in co-creating knowledge with diverse stakeholders to address challenges in agrifood systems. She is a member of the Semiarid Lab for Scaling Agrivoltaics, where she develops projects and leads research on the impact of Agrivoltaics on crop productivity, farmer livelihoods, and climate resilience with a specific focus on smallholder farmers and developing country contexts. She has worked in over fifteen countries globally, primarily in Africa, but also in Asia, Latin America, and North America. She also is an organizer of the bilingual Agrivoltaics seminar series and platform Agrovoltaicos sin Fronteras.  

Prior to joining the University of Arizona, Christine worked as a Climate Adaptation Scientist at the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) in Nairobi, Kenya. During her ten years in Kenya, Christine focused on agricultural development approaches that deliver multiple benefits: climate-smart agriculture, agroecology and agrivoltaics. A key challenge for all these approaches is understanding which options work where and for whom. She developed participatory research methods and innovative data-driven tools to drive adaptation and development from farmer’s fields to national policies and investment plans.  

Christine holds a Ph.D. in Ecology & Evolutionary Biology from the University of Arizona and B.S. in Astronomy & Physics from Haverford College.