Isha is from Nepal, a country of hills and mountains, and has spent much of her time working on grassroots-level projects mostly with farmers from rural Nepal. She has co-founded a youth-led NGO and worked in bridging gaps in technical knowledge and innovation between classrooms and farmers’ fields. She’s also worked as an agriculture researcher in the Integrated Rural Development Project funded by the Korean Government at Kathmandu University of Nepal. She was first involved in the Study Abroad Program of UC Davis and worked in the community-engaged piloting of chimney solar dryers in rural Nepal before joining the IAD program. With a background in biophysical sciences, Isha was motivated to join the program to develop knowledge and skillset to understand and analyze the inequities in agriculture systems through the lens of social science. Currently working at the Agriculture Equity and Social Inclusion lab, she seeks to understand the relationship between climate change and disasters in food security and broader agriculture systems, particularly for vulnerable farmers in the global south.

Isha is mostly exploring California and other states during the breaks and likes to enjoy a good book that doesn’t require a test on her knowledge of it during the weekends. As an international student, she wants to pave a path for those who come from less privileged backgrounds in academia. Ten years down the line Isha sees herself as a development scholar and research practitioner probably hiking to some rural village and listening to the stories of women farmers.