Ezethanie and Lucy

Ezethanie has a Master's of Agribusiness at the University of Queensland. Her degree is supported by her relevant work experience in Samoa, including as Senior Land Leases Officer for the Samoa Trust Estates Corporation.

In her role as the Parliament of Samoa's Senior Select Committee Secretary, Ezethanie was one of two Samoan representatives to the 2012 Commonwealth Youth Parliament in London. Through this opportunity, she was able to make leadership decisions on how to handle plenary procedures during select committee hearings and to assist the chairs and members of parliament on reports for parliamentary submissions.

At the Samoa Trust Estates Corporation, Ezethanie worked with the community and government on sensitive land acquisition cases. With a Bachelor's degree in Land Management and through the experiences that she gained in this role, she decided to pursue a career in land management. This process helped Ezethanie to develop skills in leading a team to handle sensitive issues and it empowered her as a woman to discuss issues with chiefs and titled men in villages.

Ezethanie would love to develop her leadership skills to support women and young people in the agriculture sector in Samoa. She has noticed that small-scale projects and groups are emerging and growing quickly, and Ezethanie would love to empower women so that they can participate in these agricultural activities and programs, which will improve their businesses and livelihoods.

Lucy is a social scientist and philosopher at CSIRO in Brisbane. Her work spans the domains of agricultural development, nutrition security, international health, and applied ethics. Part of her role is to design, facilitate and learn from stakeholder engagement processes, which aim to address complex problems across the health and biosecurity, agricultural development and food security domains. She also spends time investigating food and health systems approaches to improving livelihoods, including nutrition-sensitive agriculture approaches.

Lucy has co-authored strategic planning and operational documents for DFAT, contributed to country-level programming, and facilitated learning events for partners who are striving to improve health and nutrition outcomes by using agriculture as a primary pathway.

Her current ACIAR-funded project work includes understanding social inclusion and equity considerations for marginalised groups undergoing major transitions in India and Bangladesh. Partnership brokering, capacity development and a deep understanding of the drivers of institutional change continue to be key areas of focus in this space.

Lucy has worked in South East Asia, Africa, and recently in South Asia. She also has held roles in research and management across various sectors, including biotechnology, public policy and health.