Ertharin Cousin

Although Ertharin Cousin (born 1957) lived on Chicago’s West Side, she was one of the first females to attend Lane Tech High School, a previously all-male school on the North Side. After earning a BA from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a JD from the University of Georgia, Cousin began a very impressive career:  White House Liaison to the State Department, Senior Vice President for Albertson’s Foods, Executive Vice President and COO of Feeding America, US Ambassador to the UN Agencies for Food and Agriculture, Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme, Visiting Scholar at Stanford, Senior Global Advisor at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Founder and CEO of Food Systems for the Future. 

Among her many honors, Cousin has been named to TIME’s “100 Most Influential People” list and Foreign Policy’s “500 Most Powerful People on the Planet” list.

Why this stop? The Pink Line Kostner stop is one of the L stations that serves Lawndale, the Chicago neighborhood where Cousin grew up.

Listen to Cousin speak about global food sustainability.

Get involved—Check out the UN World Food Program USA website to learn about world hunger and to find out the many and various ways you can take part in their work