Frank Adusah-Poku is an applied micro economist whose research focuses on energy and environmental economics issues such as energy poverty, energy access, energy expenditure, environmental pollution, among others. His recent works have focused on the gender and household food security, the linkage between cooking fuel and women empowerment, and economic inequalities and rural-urban disparities in the use of clean cooking fuels. He is currently a Lecturer at the Department of Economics, KNUST. He is also a Fellow at the Africa Research and Impact Network (ARIN), Nairobi-Kenya and a Junior Research Fellow at the ENNRI-EfD Ghana. He teachers Economics courses both at the graduate and undergraduate levels. He holds a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree in Economics from Kobe University, Japan. He also hold a Master of Philosophy (M.Phil.) degree in Economics and Bachelor of Arts (B.A) degree in Economics with Statistics, both from the University of Ghana.

I am a research analyst working with MwAPATA institute. I hold a master’s degree in agriculture and applied economics specializing in environmental economics. I obtained my degree from Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources and the University of Pretoria. I am interested in several research areas including natural resource valuation, climate change issues, poverty, nutrition, and agricultural and food policy.

Sarah Edore Edewor is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow with the Nigerian Institute of Social and Economic Research, Nigeria and an Independent Agricultural Consultant. She holds a PhD in Agricultural Economics with area of specialisation in Food Marketing and International Trade from the Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta, Nigeria. Her research focus is on international trade patterns, climate change, land tenure and its impact on welfare through a gender lens. She is an African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD) One Planet Laureate Candidate. Her passion for research has made her contribute to the success of the EDULINK II ECIATA – Enhancing of Capacities on International Trade Agreements for Development of Regional Agriculture and Food Market Project, Cassava: Adding Value to Africa (CAVA II) Project Evaluation Survey, Partnership for Aflatoxin Control in Africa (PACA) and RAAF-PASANAO Projects among others. She has been a consultant to Climate Check Corporation, Canada, Global Program Green Innovation Centre, and African Economic Research Consortium (AERC). She is multidisciplinary research-oriented with proficiency in quantitative and qualitative analysis. Her vision is to see the number of people living below the poverty line reduce substantially especially in Africa where traditional farming systems, poverty and food insecurity remains predominantly high.

Anderson holds a PhD in Economics from Stellenbosch University, and an MA in Economics and Bachelor’s degree in Social Sciences (Economics), both from the University of Malawi. He is experienced conducting empirical analysis on agriculture, labor markets, poverty and inequality using Malawian household data sets. He previously worked for the International Food Policy Research Institute, contributing evidence-based policy solutions to sustainably reduce poverty and end hunger and malnutrition in Malawi. He also has experience in Malawian financial markets, the most recent being arranging debt and equity funding for transactions.

Olaoye Ibukun James is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Nigerian Institute of Social and Economic Research, Ibadan. His research interests include agricultural policy, innovation, governance, climate change, sustainability and food security. He has a Ph.D. in Agricultural Economics at the University of Ilorin, Nigeria. He received his B. Agriculture and MSc degree in Agricultural Economics also from the University of Ilorin. Besides, he holds a Master’s degree in Environmental Management from the Pan African University, Life and Earth Science Institute through the African Union Scholarship.

He has previously worked as a research assistant and training consultant on several projects by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Agricultural and Rural Management Training Institute (ARMTI), Nigerian Stored Products Research Institute (NSPRI), International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), among others. He loves to connect with his environment through research, training, volunteering, and community engagements.

Umar Kabanda is recently a Research Associate at the Economic Policy Research Centre (EPRC) in Uganda. Through the Scientific, Technical and Research Commission of Africa based in Nigeria, Umar was engaged by the African Union Commission on an ad-hoc basis as an Advisory Working Group Member to study the Socio-economic Impact of Covid-19 for Africa. Previously he worked with the European University Institute-Italy, as a Policy Research Fellow and as a coordinating officer for strengthening good governance and human rights in Africa under the African Governance Architecture (AGA III) – Ethiopia. He has also served as a consultant for IGAD, Johnson and Johnson-USA, Oxfam IBISS-Denmark, GRADE Africa and Girls Not Bride-England. He holds a PhD and master’s degree in Governance and Regional Integration from the Pan African University and the University of Yaoundé II in Cameroon, as well as a PGD in Human Rights from the University of Oslo in Norway and a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Makerere University in Uganda.

Edward Martey is an Agricultural and Applied Economist and the Head of the Socioeconomics section of the CSIR-Savanna Agricultural Research Institute. His research, development, agricultural economics, and operational work cover a range of policy-relevant questions related to poverty, development, and commercialization in Africa. Specifically, his recent research focuses on impact assessment of agricultural technologies, energy, agricultural and rural development, time poverty, and economic valuation using choice experiments.

Edward holds a Ph.D in Agricultural and Applied Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, an MPhil and BSc in Agricultural Economics from the University of Ghana, respectively.

Linda Nakato is an applied development economist currently working as a Research Associate in the Microeconomics Department at the Economic Policy Research Centre in Kampala, Uganda. She previously worked as a teaching assistant (teaching master’s courses on industrial economics and emerging markets) at the University of Agder in Norway. Her research interests include financial inclusion, social entrepreneurship, rural development, women’s economic empowerment, microfinance, and gender issues.

Nakato holds a PhD in International Business and Master of Science in Business Administration both from the University of Agder in Norway, and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics degree from Makerere University.

Justina Adwoa Onumah is a Senior Research Scientist at the CSIR-Science and Technology Policy Research Institute (STEPRI), Ghana, with broad research interest in the Economics of Innovation and Development. She also has specific interests in productivity/efficiency analysis, welfare analysis, innovation systems, impact assessment, research-policy-industry linkages, rural and MSME development. She holds a PhD in Development Studies, an MPhil in Agricultural Economics, both from the University of Ghana and a BSc in Agricultural Technology (Economics and Extension) from the University for Development Studies. Justina also has academic exchange experiences from the University of Guelph, University of Bonn, and Aalborg University. She possesses over 10 years of rich research experience through involvement in multiple donor-funded projects, consulting for organizations such as the United Nations (UNCTAD and ILO). She is also an alumna of the Mandela Washington Fellowship programme for young African leaders. Justina hopes to use the STAAARS+ fellowship to build her capacity in economic research, research-policy linkages and grow her academic network.

Pauline Nakitende is an economist with interest in Development Economics, Agricultural Economics, Education Economics and Health Economics. Pauline holds a Master of Arts in Economic Policy and Planning and a Bachelor of Development Economics, from Makerere University. Pauline is currently a Research Associate at the Economic Policy Research Centre in Uganda. She has worked as a research associate on the UNWOMEN project that analysed the implementation of the engendering fiscal stimulus packages and recovery efforts adopted in response to COVID-19 health and economic crisis in Uganda. For the STAAARS+ fellowship, Pauline is analysing Credit Access, Input Use and Food Security with evidence from Uganda with mentorship from Professor Milu Muyanga and Molly Ingram.

Dinah is an agriculture economist holding of Master’s Degree in Agriculture and Applied Economics majoring in Agricultural Policy Analysis from Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR) and the University of Pretoria. I have work experience in research, project management, and banking.

Ambrose Ogwang is a Research Associate at Economic Policy Research Centre attached to the Macroeconomics department. Ambrose holds a Master’s Degree in Economics from Makerere University and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Statistics from Kyambogo University. In some of his past studies, Ambrose has examined gender gaps in agriculture, intertemporal current account balance approach and gender difference in access to digital financial services. In addition, Ambrose also forms a team of researcher responsible for producing the quarterly bulletin of Uganda Business Climate Index. For the STAAARS+ fellowship, Ambrose is linking agricultural productivity, market performance, and technology use among farmers in Uganda, with mentorship from Professors Duncan Boughton and Rui Benfica.

Benjamin Olusegun Oyelami, Ph.D is a Communication Manager/Researcher at the Innovation Lab for Policy Leadership in Agriculture and Food security (PiLAF), University of Ibadan, Nigeria; one of the three Centres for Policy Leadership (CPL) in Africa and the only one in Nigeria. He is also a member of the board of the Justice, Development and Peace Movement (JDPM), Catholic Diocese of Oyo, Nigeria.

Dr Oyelami’s area of research interest is in entrepreneurship along the Agricultural Value Chain, Agricultural Policy as well as Rural Development. He has worked extensively within Nigeria’s rural sector among farmers and the rural folks in collaboration with various organisations among which are the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN). He has been actively involved in improved technology transfer and trainings among rural folks involved in enterprises around cassava, soybean and maize commodities including the dissemination of Aflasafe biotechnology used to control aflatoxin in grains. He still has strong passion to impact on the rural sector through training and various qualitative and participatory research approaches. He has attended academic conferences within and outside Nigeria with paper presented and published in reputable journals and conference proceedings. He was a recipient of the University of Ibadan Postgraduate Teaching and Research Assistantship Award in 2019 and he is a member of the Rural Sociological Association of Nigeria (RuSAN). He is also a recipient of the Structural Transformation of African Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAARS+) Fellowship 2022/2023 Cohorts Award; A programme of the USAID Innovation Labfor Food Security Policy, Research, Capacity and Influence (PRCI).

Dablin Mpuuga is a Development Economist with special interest in how agriculture and health interconnect for economic development in sub-Saharan Africa. Dablin holds a Masters of Arts in Economics and a First Class Bachelor of Science with Education (Mathematics & Economics), from Makerere University. Currently, Dablin is a Research Associate at the Economic Policy Research Centre, Makerere University, Uganda. He has also worked as a consultant for the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) under the 50×2030 initiative. Part of his current research examines the gendered effects of land ownership on household food security and welfare. For the STAAARS+ fellowship, Dablin is linking agricultural productivity, market performance, and technology use among farmers in Uganda, with mentorship from Professors Duncan Boughton and Rui Benfica.

Dr. Emmanuel Adu-Danso is a lecturer at the Department of Economics of the University of Ghana. He holds a Master of Philosophy Degree in Economics and a PhD in Development Economics. His research interests include innovation, entrepreneurship, education (and skills mismatch), and environmental economics. Emmanuel has published in a number of journals including Innovation and Development and the Journal of Small Business and Entrepreneurship. Emmanuel is affiliated with the African Research Universities Alliance (ARUA) as a Consultant on the ARUA-Carnegie Data-Gathering and Benchmarking Project. Emmanuel has previously worked as a Research Associate on a three-year experimental design project funded by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) on Soft Skills for the Youth in Africa (the case of Ghana) and an investigator on a national census and baseline study of ‘productive’ MSMEs in Ghana for the Ghana Enterprises Agency (GEA).

After graduating with a PhD in Economics at UC Davis, Gabriel joined the Philippine Competition Commission as an economist that works on enforcement, research and advocacy activities.

Gildas Kadoukpè Magbondé is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Economics at the University of Cape Town (UCT), majoring in the impact evaluation of public policies. Before joining UCT, Gildas has completed a master’s degree in applied macroeconomics at the University of Abomey-Calavi (UAC) and a master’s degree in international and Development Economics jointly organized by the University of Namur and the Catholic University of Louvain (Belgium). He is also affiliated with the Laboratoire de Recherche en Economie de Saint-Louis (LARES) in Senegal, where most of his reflections are macroeconomics. Macroeconomic topics such as foreign direct investment (FDI), institutions, economic growth, and structural change in developing countries are his areas of predilection. His microeconomic research lines feature impact evaluation of public policies – energy and water interventions – and rural households’ well-being. As a STAARS fellow, Gildas Kadoukpè Magbondé investigates the impact of rural electrification on household poverty in Senegal.

Gowokani is a health economist and applied econometrician interested in impact evaluations, inequality analysis and decomposition methods. The current interest is to see linkages between agricultural policies and multidimensional poverty. His STAARS research answers the question, “Does Farm input subsidy affect multidimensional child poverty in Malawi?” Currently, he works with the University of Malawi.

Hadassah May Cordero is an Economist at the Philippine Competition Commission (PCC). She holds a degree in Statistics from the University of the Philippines-Diliman. Prior to joining the government, she worked as a researcher at a non-profit think tank. Her interests lie in the field of youth development, poverty reduction, agriculture, and competition economics.

Iredele is a Researcher and Project Administrative Manager at the Innovation Lab for Policy Leadership in Agriculture & Food Security (PiLAF), University of Ibadan. PiLAF is one of the three Centres for Policy Leadership supported by the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy, Research, Capacity and Influence (PRCI). He is a recipient of the Structural Transformation of African and Asian Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAAARS+) Fellowship 2022/2023 Cohorts Award. He holds BSc and MSc degrees in Agricultural Economics from the University of Ibadan. He also holds an MBA degree from the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife. Currently, he is a doctoral student at the Centre for Petroleum, Energy Economics and Law, University of Ibadan. He has strong interest in understanding the nexus between energy and agriculture in addition to energy utilization within the agricultural value-chain in Nigeria. His thesis is focused on energy efficiency. He loves interacting with farmers and has acquired extensive experience in conducting stacked surveys at the state and national levels having been involved with several researches especially with professors from Michigan State University (MSU).

Since 2016, he has been a Research Field / In-country Coordinator for several projects funded by USAID and implemented by MSU, majority of which were under the Feed the Future Nigeria Agricultural Policy Project. He served as a consultant to World Fish, Malaysia between 2020 & 2021 where he was team lead and coordinator of the data collection on a survey to determine the effects of covid-19 pandemic on the fish and poultry value-chains across eight states in Nigeria. In 2018, he led a team of field researchers to conduct the first large survey of maize traders in Nigeria, the output of which can be found in the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy – Nigeria Agricultural Policy Project (Policy Research Brief 56, Jan 2018). He holds a position as Head, Agric Sector Research at Preston Consults, a research and management consultancy firm based in the capital city, Abuja. He also serves on the board of other business ventures. Prior to venturing into research, he had a successful ten-year experience in the Nigerian Banking industry having worked in three reputable banks. Iredele is passionate about the development of chess in Nigeria and is a prominent figure in Nigerian Chess, serving as the Chairman of Oyo State Chess Association and the Chess League Ibadan.

John holds a PhD in economics from the University of Nairobi. He is a lecturer in economics and his research interest is labour economics focusing on migration, remittances and youth unemployment. John research interests also include financial inclusion, social protection and economics of land governance. Also, he is a Cash Transfer Project Fellow at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a junior scholar with Governance and Local Development of University of Gothenburg. He is also a researcher with Swiss Sub-Saharan Africa Migration (S-SAM) Network at the University of Neuchâtel and African Economics Research Consortium (AERC).

Kwame holds a PhD in Economics from the Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University, Japan. His research interests broadly cover applied microeconomics and micro econometrics. Issues of the environment, energy and natural resources, agricultural economics, economics of development, and behavioral economics are of particular interest. He has taught microeconomic theory, public sector economics, applied statistics and related subjects and he continues to teach at the university. He has experience in the conduct of large field surveys and he likes to share his research findings with other researchers through academic seminars and conferences.

Monica Lambon-Quayefio is an applied micro economist whose research focuses on health and demographic economic issues including health, women’s empowerment and its implications, as well as poverty and inequality. Her current work involves the impact evaluation of various interventions in the broad areas of agriculture, gender empowerment labour market efficiency and SME growth in Ghana. Particularly, her recent work has focused on unpaid care work, inequality of opportunity, digital finance and informal pensions, digital skills training and its impact on SMEs as well as evaluating the impact on climate smart agriculture in Libera. She is a senior lecturer at the Department of Economics, at the University of Ghana and an a Research Fellow at the Africa Centre of Excellence in Inequality Research. She teachers Economics courses both at the graduate and undergraduate levels. She holds a doctorate degree in Economics from Clark University in Massachusetts,USA where she also obtained her Master’s degree in Economics. Her Bachelor of Arts degree was obtained in Economics with Mathematics from the University of Ghana.

Muhammed A. Usman is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Center for Development Research (ZEF), University of Bonn, where he held his Ph.D in Agricultural Economics. He holds a double Master’s degree within the Erasmus Munds Programme in Agriculture, Food and Environmental Policy Analysis (AFEPA). He obtained an M.Sc in Economics from Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and another M.Sc in Food and Resource Economics from the University of Bonn. He was a Research Fellow at the European Investment Bank and the Global Development Network (EIB–GND) program in Applied Development Finance for the 2018–19 cycle. Usman has also worked as a consultant for various international organizations including CIMMYT, Bioversity International. His research interest includes information technology and agricultural markets, food and nutrition security, rural water supply and sanitation, child health and development as well as impact evaluation. He has published in peer-reviewed journals.

Nathaniel Siji Olutegbe lectures in the Department of Agricultural Extension and Rural Development, University of Ibadan, Nigeria. His educational background is in Agricultural Extension and Rural Sociology, where he earned a PhD degree (Rural Sociology option) of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria in 2017. Nathaniel has, in the past held consultancy positions with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, (IITA) Ibadan, Nigeria on Gender Norms and Agency Studies in Nigeria for both maize and cassava. He has also been involved in a number of socioeconomic impact studies of different development interventions in Nigeria. His research interest is rural socioecological systems, with emphases on variables such as environmental, social and economic stressors, climate change, resilience, rural livelihood, insecurity, conflict, food insecurity, coping mechanisms, vulnerability, well-being, among others. Nathaniel was a co-investigator in the Climate Change, Rural Livelihoods and Ecosystem Nexus: Forest Communities in Agro-ecological zones of Nigeria, a project funded by the African Development Bank and Japan Trust Fund, under the Education for Sustainable Development in Africa (ESDA) in 2018. He is currently a Visiting Fellow in the Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management at Cornell University under the auspices of the Structural Transformation of African and Asian Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAAARS+) fellowship, 2022/2023 cohort.

Nneka Esther Osadolor is a PhD candidate of Economics under the AERC Collaborative PhD Programme (CPP) at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. She lectures at the Department of Economics, University of Benin, Nigeria. She is also a Research Associate at the Centre for Economic Policy and Development Research (CEPDeR), Covenant University, Nigeria. Her research interest focuses broadly on Development Economics and Applied Microeconomics including labour markets, financial inclusion, poverty, inequality and gender issues.

Sawuya Nakijoba is a Development Economist working as a Research Associate at the Economic Policy Research Centre (EPRC), Makerere University, Uganda. Sawuya holds a Master of Arts in Economics and a First Class Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Makerere University. She is currently a Doctoral Research Fellow at the Institute for Humanities in Africa (HUMA), University of Cape Town, South Africa. She has worked as a graduate volunteer at United Nations Development Programme, Uganda and also participated in the YPP programme at United Nations Economic Commission for Africa in Ethiopia as a Research Fellow. For the STAAARS+ fellowship, Sawuya is linking agricultural productivity, market performance, and technology use among farmers in Uganda, with mentorship from Professors Duncan Boughton and Rui Benfica.

Taye Tesfaye is a lecturer at the department of agricultural economics in Dilla University, Ethiopia. He has a Masters in Agricultural Economics from Haramaya University, Ethiopia. Currently, Taye Tesfaye is a PhD candidate at Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, India. His PhD thesis focuses on climate change adaptation, non-farm diversification, Agricultural Technologies adoption and welfare in rural Ethiopia. His research interest is in broad areas of climate change, climate change adaptation, food security, valuation of natural resources, environmental economics and non-farm activities.

Babatope Ebenezer Akinyemi lectures at the University of Fort Hare, South Africa. He is a visiting PROTEA researcher to the Centre des Sciences du Goût et de l’Alimentation (CSGA), Institut National De La Recherche Agronomique (INRA), Universite De Bourgogne Franche-Comte, Dijon, France. He is also a co-organizer of climate change mitigation and adaptation benefits of wilder rangelands workshop, an ongoing collaboration between South Africa and Sweden scholars funded by the South Africa – Sweden University Forum (SASUF). He is currently a Visiting Fellow at Cornell University under the auspices of the Structural Transformation of African Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAARS) program and works with Daniela Scur and Trinh Pham. His research interests include food security, climate change, resource economics and ecotourism.

Laura Nelima Barasa holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Radboud University Nijmegen, Netherlands. She is a lecturer at the University of Nairobi, School of Economics where she teaches Econometrics and Statistics. Her research interests include innovation, agriculture, gender, and governance. Laura has published in leading journals such as Research Policy. She is a certified European Investment Bank-Global Development Network fellow in Applied Development Finance. Laura’s affiliations include the African Economic Research Consortium, Partnership for Economic Policy and the African Network for Internationalization of Education.

Djomo Choumbou Raoul Fani lectures in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, University of Buea, Cameroon. He was previously a research fellow at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) under the project “Youth Researching Youth” He was also a research assistant for Africa Land Barometer Scoping Exercise at Sue Mbaya and Associates. He can also look back to 14 years’ experience in consultancy for development projects where he focused on monitoring and evaluation, impact assessment, teaching, training, and capacity building activities. His research interest includes and is not limited to impact assessment, agricultural policy, production economics, farm management, climate change, value chain analysis, agricultural finance, poverty alleviation, food security, and resources economics.

Martha Kibru Melese is a lecturer at the department of economics in Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. She has a Masters in Applied Labor Economics for Development from University of Turin, The Institu d’Etudes Politiques de Paris (Science Po) and International Training Centre of the ILO (ITC-ILO). She also has a Masters in Economic Analysis from Addis Ababa University. Currently, Martha is a PhD candidate at Addis Ababa University in collaboration with Jönköping International Business School (JIBS), Sweden. Her PhD thesis focuses on rural labor market in Ethiopia and provides evidence on determinants and implications of labor allocation decisions of rural households. Martha’s main research interests are labor and development economics. She is interested in understanding vulnerability and mechanisms that enhance resilience to shocks.

Chitwan Lalji is an Assistant Professor at the Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode (India). Prior to joining IIM Kozhikode, she obtained her Ph.D. in economics from IIT Kanpur. Her research interests lie in the field of health economics, labour economics and development economics. She is currently working on several RCTs in India, focusing on women’s safety, women’s wellbeing during covid-19, and maternal and child health. Her research has been published in reputed journals, including the Health Economics, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization and Journal of Development Studies.

Maggie Munthali has PhD in Geography, University Pretoria, South Africa, specializing in the use of Remote Sensing and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for forest and natural resource management. She also has MSc. in Sustainable Soil Resource Management, University of Nairobi, Kenya and BSc Forestry (Mzuzu University, 2008). Additionally, she has over 10 years’ work experience in forestry research and development, natural resource management and integrated soil fertility management. She has extensive experience in the integration of social elements including gender, disadvantaged and vulnerable groups in forestry interventions. She is a member of the American Society of Agronomy(ASA), Crop Science Society of America (CSSA) and Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) which is a scientific and professional society of agronomists and scientists of related disciplines. She is also an African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD) fellow. AWARD is a career-development program that equips top women agricultural scientists across sub-Saharan Africa to accelerate agricultural gains by strengthening their research and leadership skills, through tailored fellowships. In June 2014, graduated as a LEAD (Leadership for Environment and Development) fellow, Cohort 19. LEAD fellowship programme is a world-class training programme that gives emerging leaders the skills, knowledge and network of contacts to bring about transformational change for a sustainable future. As a Research fellow, Maggie is responsible for conducting research and policy analysis on fisheries and aquaculture policy issues.

Tabitha C. Nindi is a Research Fellow (Agribusiness management and rural development) at the Centre for Innovation and Industrial Research (CIIR) under the Malawi University of Science and Technology (MUST). She has extensive experience in econometric methods using observational data, running large RCTs, implementing experimental auctions, and developing math programming models. Tabitha is passionate about Agriculture and rural development and her current research interests include poverty and rural development, agricultural technology and innovations, agricultural marketing, food security and food safety.

Zephania Bondera Nyirenda is a Research Analyst at MwAPATA Institute in Malawi. He obtained his Master’s Degree in Agricultural and Applied Economics from the University of Malawi and University of Pretoria. His research interests are in poverty reduction, land tenure, agricultural and food policy, and nutrition. He is currently a Visiting Fellow at Cornell University under the Structural Transformation of African Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAARS) program and works with Ass. Prof. Brian Dillon and Sergio Puerto.

Christone Nyondo works as a Research Fellow at MwAPATA Institute, an indigenous Policy Research Institute in Malawi that focuses on issues relating to agricultural, natural resource management and rural development policy. Prior to joining MwAPATA Institute in 2019, Christone worked as a Policy Analyst in the New Alliance Policy Acceleration Support (NAPAS) Project in the Department of Agricultural Planning Services in the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA). He joined the NAPAS project from the MoA where he worked as a Chief Economist. Christone is currently a Visiting Fellow in the Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management at Cornell University, courtesy of the Structural Transformation of African Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAAARS+) program. He primary works with Brian Dillion and Sergio Puerto under the overall oversight of Christopher Barrett. His primary areas of research interest include agricultural policy, public policy processes, agricultural market integration and economics of program evaluation.

Dr. Debayan Pakrashi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economic Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur. After completing his PhD in Economics from the School of Economics, University of Queensland, with the Dean’s Award for Outstanding Research Higher Degree Theses, he joined IIT Kanpur. He is an applied microeconomist particularly interested in issues related to public policy and public health. His fields of specialization are Impact Evaluation, Health, Development, Labour, Behavioural and Experimental Economics. Dr. Pakrashi believes in being a change-maker and so he regularly works in the slums, rural and coastal regions, with different vulnerable groups.

For his research work, Dr. Pakrashi received the Australian Alumni Excellence Award India under the Young Achiever Category, the Institute Fellowship (2014-2017) and the PK Kelkar Class of 1979 Research Fellowship for Outstanding Young Faculty (2017-2020) from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur and the Prof. M. J. Manohar Rao Award 2016 awarded to young scholars under the age of 35 from The Indian Econometric Society, for his research and development efforts. He also received the Mathematical Research Impact Centric Support (MATRICS) grant scheme under Quantitative Social Sciences (QSS) from SERB (2020-23) and was selected for J-PAL South Asia’s Indian Scholars Program (2021-2022) for his ongoing public health research.

Tekalign Gutu Sakketa is a researcher at the German Development Institute/Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE), Germany. He attained his Ph.D. in Agricultural Economics from Bonn University of Germany in 2018. His PhD thesis focuses on youth in agriculture with special emphasis on social comparisons, well-being, and employment preferences. Tekalign’s main research interests are urban-rural linkages, behavioral and labor economics with a focus in the areas of social protection, conflict, shocks and household economic decisions. His current research projects include the impact of conflicts on firm performance, and the interplay between urbanization, rural development and social cohesion in Africa.

Rayner is a development economist. His research focuses on rural livelihoods in Sub Saharan Africa. I most recently served as Country Economist for the International Growth Centre(IGC).

Sounak Thakur an Assistant Professor of Economics at the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur. He is an Applied Microeconomist with a focus on studying families and intra-household decision making in the context of developing countries. He takes a keen interest in studying the formation of families, institutions governing family formation and ramifications thereof, particularly in respect of intrahousehold bargaining and fluctuations in resource allocation (to individuals) in response to shocks.

Muthoni Ng’ang’a (Ph.D) is an assistant lecturer at Kenyatta University and Strathmore University. She attained her PhD in Economics from the University of Nairobi in 2019. In her PhD thesis, she wrote essays on academic achievement in public and private primary schools in Kenya where among other things she examined gender gaps in mathematics scores. She is an East Africa Social Science Translation (EASST) fellow, University of California, Berkeley (2019). Muthoni’s main research interests are in agriculture, education, labour and gender issues, and in using randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to evaluate interventions in those sectors. Current research projects include Using iBeacons to Track the Distribution of Development Goods in Kenya.

Sarobidy Rakotonarivo is an environmental socio-economist with an interdisciplinary background in natural resource management. She uses surveys, choice experiments, behavioural games, qualitative interviews, deliberative approaches and mixed methods to understand decision-making in the areas of rural livelihoods, environmental justice, environmental economics, climate change mitigation, and conservation.  She just completed a three-year postdoctoral research on conservation-food security conflicts at the University of Stirling. She received a double PhD degree in Environmental and Development economics from Bangor university and the university of Copenhagen in 2016. Her PhD thesis examined the true local welfare costs of conservation restrictions in Madagascar. Prior to her PhD, she used the lens of political ecology to analyse the institutional arrangements and land-use conflicts within a REDD+ pilot project in Tanzania.

Emmanuel is a development economist with a focus on health and education. He is currently a postdoctoral research associate at the Institute for Food and Resource Economics at the University of Bonn, Germany. His main research is concerned with determinants and effects of health insurance in Uganda and Rwanda, the effects of childhood work in Ethiopia, and drivers of aspirations in Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, and Namibia. He uses both quantitative and qualitative research methods. He has occasionally provided policy and analysis support to multilateral and international non-governmental organizations in East Africa. At Cornell, he is working with Prof Scur on health insurance and labor markets in Rwanda.

Blessing Atwine is currently serving as a research Analyst in the Microeconomics department at Economic Policy Research Centre (EPRC). She holds a Masters of Arts degree in Economics and a first class Bachelors degree of Arts in Economics from Makerere University. Through her engagement with the Economic Policy Research Centre, Blessing has participated in data collection, data analysis and report writing. She has been engaged in a number of quantitative and qualitative studies the most recent being Youth Employment Education and Skill, Girls Empowering Girls and Employment growth determinants.

Birhan S. Demissie is an assistant professor in the Institute of Disaster Risk Management & Food Security Studies at Bahir Dar University. He received his Ph.D. degree in Development Studies from Addis Ababa University (Ethiopia) in 2018. His Ph.D. thesis investigated the state and determinants of poverty, vulnerability and resilience in rural Ethiopia by applying a range of econometric models. In his Ph.D. thesis, Demissie found the continuing scourge of poverty in Ethiopia, weather shocks as the major drivers of poverty and resilience capacities as the key mitigation measures of adverse shock impacts. Advancing his Ph.D. research agenda, Demissie is currently focusing on investigating the impact of weather shocks on household wellbeing outcomes (food security) and the real contributions of household resilience capacity in mitigating shock impacts. Demissie is highly interested in using multi-topic quality datasets and applying inter-disciplinary resilience research methodologies in context specific geographical regions (e.g., Sub-Sahara Africa).

Nathan Sunday is a Research Analyst at Economic Policy Research Centre (EPRC). He holds a Masters degree in Economics and first class Bachelor of Science with Education in Mathematic and Economics from Makerere University. In some of his past and current research work, Nathan has examined the banking industry in Uganda, agriculture financing in Uganda, unemployment in East Africa, and firm performance in Africa. While at EPRC, he has been engaged in various research projects aimed at shaping Uganda’s policy agenda. He also forms part of the team that conducts the Uganda Businesses Climate Index (BCI) analysis on quarterly basis at EPRC. Nathan conducts research using both qualitative and quantitative methods. At Cornell, he is working on household resilience to climate change in Uganda, with Dr. Soji Adelaja and Dr. Justin Kappiaruparampil as mentor and co-mentor respectively.

Rehema Kahunde is a Research Analyst at Economic Policy Research Centre (EPRC). She holds a Masters degree in Economics and first class Bachelor’s degree of Arts in Economics from Makerere University, Uganda. In her past and current research work, Rehema has examined the tax system in East Africa, Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Uganda through the quarterly Business Climate Index analysis, and unemployment and labour externalization in Uganda. While at EPRC, Rehema has been engaged in various research projects aimed at shaping Uganda’s policy direction. She is engaged in both qualitative and quantitative research.
Regarding the STAAARS+ programme, Rehema is part of the team that is working on household resilience to climate change in Uganda, where Dr. Soji Adelaja and Dr. Justin Kappiaruparampil will be the team mentor and co-mentor respectively.

Tesfahun A. Kasie is an assistant professor in the Institute of Disaster Risk Management & Food Security Studies at Bahir Dar University (Ethiopia). His main research interests include disaster risk, livelihood resilience and food security. He received his doctoral degree in Local Development & International Cooperation from Jaume I University (Spain) in 2017. His Ph.D. thesis examined resilience properties of rural livelihoods constructed in the risky environments of Ethiopia. In his thesis he makes use of interdisciplinary perspectives involving Modern Portfolio Theory, Household Economy and Social-ecological systems Approaches to explain resilience properties of household livelihood systems with food security as the primary wellbeing outcomes of concern. Following his Ph.D. study he continued investigating the same research agenda on risk and resilience as applied to social systems covering wider range of wellbeing outcomes including health and nutrition security.

Dr Ndeye Fatou Faye is a research fellow at the Bureau of Macroeconomic Analyses of the Senegalese Institute of Agricultural Research. She got her PhD in Economics in 2017 from Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar, after a master degree in Public Policies and Development from the Paris School of Economics. For her PhD, Dr Faye worked on determinants and impact of adoption of improved pearl millet and sorghum seeds. Her main research interests are technology adoption, value chains studies and impact assessment. Dr Faye has been engaged in many qualitative and quantitative studies, particularly a four-year project which aimed to analyse the main agricultural products values chains in Senegal (cereals, horticultural projects, seeds and other inputs). She also conducted impact assessment of development projects in Senegal.

Amy Faye is a citizen of Senegal and holds a Bachelor degree in Mathematics and Economics from the University Toulouse 1 Capitole and a Master’s degree in industrial organization from the Toulouse School of Economics. Following her studies, Amy started working at the Senegalese Institute of Agricultural Research (ISRA), beginning with an internship. She took an interest in agricultural economics which motivated her to join the macro-economic analysis unit (BAME) within ISRA as a research assistant in 2012 when she also registered as a doctoral student at the Faculty of Economics of the University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar. She is now a full-time researcher in the same unit. Her Ph.D. research focused on modeling climate change impacts on irrigation water availability and analyzing taxation policy to manage groundwater resources in the northern coastal area of Senegal called Niayes. She completed her dissertation in early 2018. During her Ph.D. she has worked in collaboration with researchers from the University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar, IFPRI and LUKE (Finland). Amy has also worked on many other topics among which agricultural susatainability at farm level, value chains analysis, collective action and its impact on farms revenus and other topics related to peasant economics.

Mouhamed is an experienced Research Analyst with a strong background in Survey Design, Impact Assessment, and Econometric modelling. Graduated from the National School of Statistics (ENSAE) in 2014, Mouhamed also holds a Master’s degree in Statistics and Econometrics from UCAD in 2017. In 2019, he is awarded with the Gender-Responsive Researcher fellowship through the GREAT program by Cornell University and Makerere University.
Over the past 6 years, He successfully managed and monitored over 40 surveys from different domains of Agriculture and rural development, at different stages of Value Chains, and for a wide range of national and international partners such as MSU, IFPRI, CIRAD, Kiel University, and FAO etc. As a research analyst, he conducted many technical efficiency studies using Stochastic Frontier Methods. He also contributed to several nationwide impact evaluations by building state-of-the-art survey designs and running matching methods.
Mouhamed is a passionate of teaching and capacity building. He provides training in Agricultural Statistics at ENSAE, and to PhD students in Economics and staff of Ministry of Agriculture in Senegal.

Marcel Vitouley is a research assistant at Institue for Empirical Research in Political Economy (IERPE) where he performs surveys design and statistical analysis. He uses quantitative methods to evaluate the impact of social reforms in Sub-Saharan Africa with a focus on Benin. His is interested in development economics especially on issues related to agriculture, education and infrastructure.

Dr. Karim Nchare is an Assistant Professor at the African School of Economics and a Visiting Research Scholar at the Department of Politics of Princeton University. He has advanced skills in field-based socio-economic research methods including preparation of survey tools, supervising data collection, performing data analysis, and writing technical reports. His research interests include applications of causal inference techniques and nonparametric statistical methods to policy evaluation, efficiency analysis, and industrial organization. Dr. Nchare received his Ph.D. in Economics from the Pennsylvania State University with a concentration in Econometrics. He also holds an MSc in Applied Statistics from Ecole Normale Superieure de Statistiques et d’Economie Appliquee (ENSEA), and an MSc in Economics from the University of Montreal. He is fluent in English and French.

Abdoulaye Djido is a Rural Development Economist with research interest on the impact evaluation of agricultural extension projects, technology uptake and diffusion, gender gap in land and labor productivity, youth and gender employment choices and their linkages to poverty dynamics and food security in the Sahel. Dr. Djido is also interested on trade integration and the potential impact of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) in accelerating economic growth and transformation in Africa.

Dr. Djido has recently worked at the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) in Rwanda. His work experience started at Partnership for Economic Policy (PEP) in Kenya before joining the University of Niamey in October 2016.

Larissa is a Researcher at the University of Dschang and has just completed a Ph.D. in Applied Economy Policy and Analysis. Her PhD dissertation concerns three essays on the political economic of African Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs). She examined SWFs emergence and proliferation in a context of extreme poverty , boom of population growth rate, urgent development needs with specific focus : on SWFs as tools for political survival , SWFs as tool of institutional reform for a better governance and management of resource revenues and SWFs as a tool to address infrastructure finance gap in fragile and conflicts affected States through co-investments between Multi-Development Banks (MDB), foreign most performant SWFs and African SWFs host countries. These type of Co-investments can help to mitigate political risks in fragile contexts and help reconstruction and peacebuilding process in post-conflicts regions.

Her scholarly interest’s lies at the intersection of: Applied macro-economy, development economics, Applied Econometric, Survival Models, Economy of Fragile and Conflicts Affected States. Recently, she is also interested in researching on poverty dynamics , Gender Studies, Climate Adaptation Studies, Impact Evaluation methods, Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) modelling and micro- applied economy. She has been involved in research collaborations with the World Bank, UNU-WIDER and currently with Cornell University under STAARS program.

Phyllis Mumia Machio is a Lecturer at the School of Economics, University of Nairobi. She completed her PhD in economics in 2014 from University of Nairobi where she also undertook her Master of Arts in Economics and Bachelor’s degrees. Her areas of research are mainly health economics, labor economics, agricultural economics, education, poverty and inequality

Thierno Malick Diallo is from Senegal. He is completing his PhD in Economics at Gaston Berger University in Senegal, where he teaches econometrics and descriptive statistics courses at the undergraduate level. His academic qualifications include a M.S.c in Applied Economics (Gaston Berger University); and M.Sc. in economic and quantitative analysis (Université Gaston Berger University). His research fields cover many development economics issues including labor economics, gender equality, poverty and rural economics. Thierno Malick Diallo has 6 years’ consultancy experience working on labor market and gender equality issues.

Khadijat Busola Amolegbe  is a lecturer at the University of Ilorin, Nigeria. She was a visiting fellow at Cornell University as part of the Structural Transformation of African Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAARS) program, and worked with Joanna Upton, Liz Bageant, and Sylvia Blom. Her research interests include food security, poverty, inequality, labour market participation, and climate change.

Mumina Shibia is a graduate student and research assistant at Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas, United States. She is currently undertaking a Ph.D. in agricultural and applied economics and is a Borlaug higher education for agricultural research and development scholar. Her dissertation research is on the impact of index based insurance on livestock production for pastoral households in Northern Kenya. She received her Master of Science in agricultural and applied economics (specialized in agribusiness), her Bachelor of Science in agricultural economics, and her Diploma in agricultural education and extension from Egerton University Kenya. She is an applied economist working for the Kenya agricultural and livestock research organization. She worked as a monitoring and evaluation expert for 3 national wide projects: Kenya agricultural productivity and sustainable land management, Kenya agricultural productivity and agribusiness, and Kenya adaptation to climate change in the arid and semi-arid lands funded by the World Bank and the Government of Kenya. Her research interests include applied development economics specifically focusing on: risk management and resilience to shocks, food security, food nutrition, pastoral household livelihoods, entrepreneurship and agricultural product value chain development, sustainable land and water management and conservation, community-driven development innovations, and participatory project monitoring and evaluation. Mumina is interested in applied microeconomics, econometrics, and agricultural policy.

Colleta is a Researcher at the University of Pretoria and has just completed a PhD in Agricultural Economics. Her PhD analyzes the changing nature and quality of agricultural machinery in South Africa with a specific focus on tractors. Her passion lies in productivity analysis, innovation and the economics research and development in agriculture.

Soumaila Gansonré holds a Ph.D. in Applied Agricultural Economics and Policy and a M.Phill. in Applied Macroeconomics. His scholarly interests center on the analysis of decision-making under risk and more generally in applied research on poverty, food insecurity and inequality reduction. Soumaila’s research interests also include the measurement and strategies of wealth creation in the rural settings by smallholder farmers in developing countries. Fluent in French and English, Soumaila is looking forwards to embrace a career as a researcher or policy analyst.

Wondimagegn Tesfaye is currently a Poverty Economist (ET Consultant) at the World Bank, Ethiopia Country Office. He has a PhD in Economics from Maastricht University and the United Nations University – Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (UNU-MERIT), in the Netherlands. He received his MSc degree in Agricultural Economics from Haramaya University, Ethiopia, where he has served as a Lecturer. His research interest revolves around development economics with a particular focus on areas including agricultural innovations, sustainable intensification, food and nutrition security, poverty dynamics and resilience, agricultural households’ decision making, social protection, and distributional impacts of policies and programs. Wondimagegn has a strong interest in quantitative methods particularly applied Microeconometrics, impact evaluation, mathematical programming, and fiscal incidence analysis.

Ruth Magreta is a doctoral student in agricultural and resource economics at the Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources in Malawi. She holds a Master of Science degree in agriculture and applied economics with specialization in agriculture policy analysis. Her research interests are in the areas of economic analysis of the behavior of maize farmers under climate risk in Malawi.

Chiyembekezo Chafuwa is a Ph.D student in Agricultural and Resource Economics at Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR). She is also working as a Research Analyst at International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) under Malawi Strategy Support Program (MaSSP). Her research interests include economic and rural development, price analysis, and food security in Malawi. She holds a Master of Science Degree in Development and Natural Resource Economics from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU) in collaboration with Bunda College, Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR), and a Bachelor of Science degree in Statistics from the University of Malawi, Chancellor College.

Dambala Gelo works as a Postdoc Fellow in the School of Economics, University of Cape Town, South Africa. He is a Research Associate at Public and Environmental Economics Research Centre(PEERC), University of Johannesburg and Research Fellow in the Department of Economics, University of Mannheim. Dambala is an applied microeconomist and applied econometrician, who focuses on development, environmental and public economics issues. Much of his research involves applications of natural experiment and field experiments for identification of causal effects in commons management, energy, education, household’s saving and agricultural contracts. His other empirical researches has focused on non-market valuation where he applied discrete choice modelling to estimate the benefits of environmental and other public goods in monetary terms. In behavioural economics, his research interest involves behavioral decision theory and behavioral game theory. Here, he is primarily interested in individual preferences and learning under uncertainty, strategic reasoning, and group interaction in situations involving coordination, cooperation, and conflict. Applications of interest are technology adoption and investment under uncertainty, bargaining, incomplete contracts, competition, commons appropriation and public goods contribution.

Dambala received his PhD in Economics from University of Pretoria and MSc in Economics from Norwegian University of life Sciences.

Adamon holds a PhD in agricultural economics from the University of Trento in Italy. He is currently associate professor of economics at the Université Catholique de Bukavu, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and a consultant at the African Development Bank under the Structural Transformation of African Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAARS) project. His research interest focuses on applied micro-econometrics, development economics and agricultural economics. He has undertaken several studies on poverty dynamics, land allocation, access to credit, technology adoption, and agricultural productivity. He has used extensively the Living Standards Measurement Study-Integrated Survey on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) in his research.

Andinet Woldemichael is a Senior Research Economist at the African Development Bank Group, Development Research Department. His research interest is in broader areas of development microeconomics with a focus on health, risk and insurance, education, nutrition, agriculture, and project impact evaluation. He received his PhD in Economics from Georgia State University and completed a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at the University of Maryland Baltimore.

Kibrom, an Ethiopian citizen, currently works as Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Copenhagen. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Economics from the University of Copenhagen in 2013. He obtained his M.Sc. degree in Economics from the University of Copenhagen in 2010. Before moving to Denmark for his graduate studies, Kibrom worked as graduate assistant at Mekele University (Ethiopia) (2006-2008).

Kibrom’s research interest lies at the intersection of applied microeconometrics, behavioral economics and development economics. In doing his Ph.D. and Postdoctoral projects, he has conducted research broadly involving applied microeconometrics and policy evaluation methods in various economic problems, mainly behavioral and development economics. He possesses strong quantitative and microeconometric skills that can be applied to wide spectrum of economic problems. He also an expert on discrete choice modelling and has published some papers on empirical and methodological aspects related to choice modeling.

Recently, he is more interested in researching on the psychological and behavioral implications of poverty. In some of his recent work, he is investigating the implication of psychological capital and personality traits on intertemporal decision making behavior, including saving behavior, considering rural households in Ethiopia. In another project, he is exploring behavioral and psychological explanations to reconcile the existing low levels adoption of seemingly profitable agricultural technologies in Sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere.

Didier Alia is a Doctoral Student in Agricultural Economics at the University of Kentucky since Fall 2012. He holds a BSc. and a MSc. in Mathematics from the University of Abomey-Calavi (Benin) in 2006 and a Statistician-Economist Engineer Diploma (MSc) from the Sub-Regional Institute of Statistics and Applied Economics (ISSEA – Cameroon). His research interests range from micro-econometrics applied to agricultural issues to macro-econometrics of international development. He is particularly interested in the welfare assessment and food security impact of agricultural research, agricultural technologies and policies across value chain actors. He is also interested in international trade, agricultural markets and institutions analysis and more broadly development economics.

Dr. Mulu Amare is a development and agricultural economist with international experience in impact evaluation, poverty and quantitative data analysis. Research themes have focused on agricultural production and intensification, trade and market, migration and development, causes of poverty and poverty traps.

He holds a PhD in Development Economics from KU Leuven in Belgium. He is currently researcher at the Faculty of Business and Economics at University of Abomey Calavi in Benin. His research focus on micro-economic issues of development, but he was always very interested in macro-economic issues as well. He has quantitative skills and he has a thorough understanding of econometric techniques. He is a researcher network member of institutions such as the Partnership for Economic Policy (PEP) and the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC). He has undertaken several studies with these institutions and others. He has been involved in research projects on agriculture, governance, social protection, and employment issues. He has presented some research works in several international conferences and published some of them in peer review journals.

Tagel Gebrehiwot is a graduate economist and is a research fellow at the Environment and Climate Research Center (ECRC) of the Ethiopian Development Research Institute (EDRI). He received his Ph.D. from the University of Twente, the Netherlands, in 2012. His field of expertise includes policy impact evaluation, poverty and food security analysis, climate vulnerability assessments and farm level adaptation to climate change, environmental impact assessment, and agricultural insurance and risk sharing. He also gained ample experience in applied econometrics, spatial analysis, remote sensing and GIS in relation to drought monitoring and various aspects of environmental applications.

Dr. Bethuel Kinyanjui Kinuthia is a lecturer at the University of Nairobi, School of Economics. He focuses on economic statistics, institutional economics and trade theory. His research work focuses mainly on trade and finance in developing countries. He works with different organizations such as UNCTAD, INFRI, AERC, WOTRO, Swiss Development Agency and IOM in different projects. He is currently working on impact of trade and labour markets in economic development, Innovations in developing countries, Diaspora and Economic Development in Kenya, Cash transfer programs on Kenya and Ghana, and on financial inclusion and inequality in Kenya. He has a PhD in Economics in Leiden University in the Netherlands.

Dr. Kiplimo Langat is a Development Economist with over 10 years experience in consultancy, research and training in both public and private sectors. He is currently a Senior Lecturer in the School of Business and Economics, Department of Agricultural Economics, Moi University. He has engaged on a wide variety of rural and urban development related projects at various scales in Africa; including agricultural and agribusiness strategic planning. He has experience in impact evaluation, value chain development, research designs, econometric modeling and data analysis. He has experience in the analysis of survey data, panel data and time series data. His areas of interest in research include evaluation of public policies in agriculture, health, education and food and nutrition; sustainable development and value chain development,. He is currently an active member of AGRODEP (African Growth and Development Policy) consortium facilitated by IFPRI where he has attended several capacity building training. He was recently involved in research designs and data analysis in an EU 7th Framework project; Biowaste4SP being implemented in 5 countries in Africa. He has previously undertaken several consultancy assignments involving training of Central Bank of Nigeria staff in ABUJA Nigeria, study design and data analysis for USAID projects on Value Chain Development and Investment Plan, European Union (EU), AU, GoK, NGOs and other private companies in Kenya and Africa.

Dr. Nkechi S. Owoo is a lecturer at the University of Ghana. She has a specialization in spatial econometrics and her research focuses on microeconomic issues in developing countries, including household behavior, health, agriculture, and gender issues. She has been involved in research collaborations with the World Bank, UNU-WIDER and the IDRC. Dr. Owoo’s work has been accepted for presentation at high profile meetings such as the Population Association of America, Global Development Network (GDN) conference, among others.