CAFS Alumna Heads to Harvard Esther Akwii LLM’20 worked with smallholder farmers and held a position at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations before coming to Vermont Law School. As an LLM Fellow at the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems (CAFS), she helped to pilot a range of projects in partnership with organizations across the U.S. She wrote a background paper on rural development for the Farm Bill Law Enterprise; developed legal memos on farm business structures, agritourism, food safety and labor for Farm Commons; created a brief on rural food access for the Healthy Food Policy Project; and worked on a handbook about policies that promote farm to school programs for the National Farm to School Network. She also taught at VLS as an adjunct professor and presented at conferences alongside scholars from across the country. Now Akwii will be joining some of those scholars in her new position as a Clinical Fellow at Harvard Law School’s Food Law and Policy Clinic. CAFS partners with the Harvard clinic on projects including the Blueprint for a National Food Strategy and the Farm Bill Law Enterprise. Akwii will keep shaping those projects in her new position, and the CAFS team is thrilled to continue working with her. “Esther is one of the hardest working people I know, taking on more
Esther Akwii LLM’20
work than seemed humanly possible. All the while she brought a lot of sunshine into otherwise gloomy Vermont winters,” said CAFS Director Laurie Beyranevand JD’03. “While we are reluctant to see her go, we take some solace in knowing she’ll be just a short drive away.”
Law at the Intersection of Agriculture and Energy In August, the VLS team behind the Farm and Energy Initiative—a collaboration between the Institute for Energy and the Environment and the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems— announced the launch of their new website. Directed by Staff Attorney and Assistant Professor Genevieve Byrne, the open-access resource helps farmers, researchers, and policymakers craft solar siting policies that build a renewable energy infrastructure while also preserving farmland. Many students contributed to the initiative, including Carlson Swafford JD/MELP’20, who shares his insights. “I came to VLS to learn how to use policy to create enabling environments that reward appropriate economic activity and propagate equitable socio-ecological systems. I was and am convinced that our economy can and does thrive with more complete environmental value sets. When I learned about the Farm and Energy Initiative (FEI), I jumped at the opportunity because it touched so many points I wanted to address. My work with the FEI has been really useful because my project—analyzing solar siting on agricultural land— focused on questions at the nexus of economic and environmental change, including development pressure, existing activities, ecosystem services, and planning. Renewable energy generally provides a fascinating case study that illustrates how small policy shifts can change revenue flows and alter the economics of downstream projects significantly. Our work revealed how complex the question of renewable energy siting can be. The work showed me how farmers could diversify operations in a way that provides more financial stability
while also decreasing inputs and environmental harms. However, the work also raised many ancillary questions that have driven me to explore other policy areas, including local and impact investment pathways, producer and consumer cooperatives, securities reporting and regulation, zoning, open-source licensing, the sharing economy generally, energy cropping, and most recently, renewable natural gas. Working with the FEI is like a thread that you can’t stop pulling. You may pick up the thread on a farm in Windsor County, Vermont, only to look up and discover that you’re discussing the Paris Agreement. On the way back home, you’ll talk about FERC, regional energy and compliance markets, state-level planning, and local zoning and implementation. All in all, the FEI helped me examine how the economy at large interacts with the biosphere, listen to the pain points environmentally and economically, and dream up ways to make it all flow more freely.”
— CARLSON SWAFFORD JD/MELP’20
Maggie Curran JD/ MERL’21 POSITION: Summer Associate, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, Philadelphia Energy Practice Group PERSPECTIVE: “My summer at Morgan Lewis was everything I had hoped it would be, even in a remote environment. Projects I worked on included Virtual Power Purchase Agreement deals for the purchase of solar and wind energy. I completed research and drafted testimony for a Default Service Program proceeding before the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission. Additionally, I completed research to support client interests in areas such as energy storage, offshore wind, electric vehicles, and microgrids. I was able to gain experience with a variety of different matters within the energy law field. This experience provided a great foundation for my future career.” PURPOSE: “As a JD/MERL student, I’m interested in the energy transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. When applying for summer internships last fall, I knew that I wanted to work in energy law and I knew that I wanted to work in Philadelphia. The Masters in Energy Regulation and Law (MERL) program at VLS made that possible for me.”
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@cafscenter to see food law and policy work in action
Visit the site at :
FARMANDENERGYINITIATIVE.ORG
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