Paola D’anello is a PhD researcher at the Van Vollenhoven Institute for Law, Governance and Society at Leiden Law School. Her work is situated within the ERC-funded Data Governance for Equitable and Sustainable Digital Food Systems (DIGIFOOD) project, where her research focuses on Colombia. With a transdisciplinary background that moves from technological design and agricultural sciences toward critical social studies, she is particularly interested in how technological innovation and data practices can support rural livelihoods in fair and equitable ways.

She holds an MSc in Rural Development and Innovation from Wageningen University, supported by a Colfuturo scholarship, where her master’s thesis examined sociotechnical imaginaries and data governance in digital food systems initiatives in Medellín. She also completed a master’s degree in Agricultural Heritage at the University of Florence, funded by the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS), researching Indigenous traditional knowledge and water management practices in Colombia. She obtained a bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Engineering from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

Her professional experience includes work with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP) on development projects involving extensive fieldwork with smallholder farmers, Afro-Colombian and Indigenous communities. Her roles have included monitoring and evaluation, policy design, technological assessment, and data and geospatial analysis in food systems research.