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Who we are

With research staff from more than 60 countries, and offices across the globe, IFPRI provides research-based policy solutions to sustainably reduce poverty and end hunger and malnutrition in developing countries.

researcher spotlight

Kalyani Raghunathan

Kalyani Raghunathan is Research Fellow in the Poverty, Gender, and Inclusion Unit, based in New Delhi, India. Her research lies at the intersection of agriculture, gender, social protection, and public health and nutrition, with a specific focus on South Asia and Africa. 

Where we work

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Where we work

IFPRI currently has more than 600 employees working in over 80 countries with a wide range of local, national, and international partners.

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experts

Poverty, Gender, and Inclusion

Shalini Roy

Senior Research Fellow

Bio

Shalini Roy is a Senior Research Fellow in the Poverty, Gender, and Inclusion Unit. Her research focuses on the relationship between households’ economic behavior and social protection, nutrition, agriculture, gender, and early childhood development. Much of her work is based on impact evaluations of development programming, with a particular interest in how programs both affect and are affected by intrahousehold dynamics. Her work spans South Asia (with a regional focus in Bangladesh), Africa, and Latin America. Shalini’s recent research includes comparing impacts of food and cash transfers on food security, nutrition, gender dynamics, and early childhood development in Bangladesh and Uganda; evaluating impacts of large-scale cash transfer projects in Mali, Brazil, and Mexico; and assessing gender- and nutrition-related impacts of agricultural projects in Bangladesh. Shalini has been at IFPRI since 2009 and holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania.

Languages spoken: English, Bangla, Spanish (basic)

 

Publications

CV

Publications

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Working Paper

Does nutrition-sensitive social protection protection build longer-term resilience? Experimental evidence from Bangladesh

2024Ahmed, Akhter U.; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Hoddinott, John; Roy, Shalini
Details

Does nutrition-sensitive social protection protection build longer-term resilience? Experimental evidence from Bangladesh

Evidence shows that cash and in-kind transfer programs increase food security while interventions are ongoing, including during or immediately after shocks. But less is known about whether receipt of these programs can have protective effects for household food security against shocks that occur several years after interventions end. We study the effects of a transfer program implemented as a cluster-randomized control trial in rural Bangladesh from 2012-2014 – the Transfer Modality Research Initiative (TMRI) – on food security in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. We assess TMRI’s impacts at three post-program time points: before the shock (2018), amidst the shock (2021), and after the immediate effects of the shock (2022). We find that TMRI showed protective effects on household food security during and after the pandemic, but program design features “mattered”; positive impacts were only seen in the treatment arm that combined cash transfers with nutrition behavior change communication (Cash+BCC). Other treatment arms – cash only, and food only – showed no significant sustained effects on our household food security measures after the intervention ended, nor did they show protective effects during the pandemic. A plausible mechanism is that investments made by Cash+BCC households in productive assets – specifically livestock – increased their pre-shock resilience capacity.

Year published

2024

Authors

Ahmed, Akhter U.; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Hoddinott, John; Roy, Shalini

Citation

Ahmed, Akhter U.; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Hoddinott, John; and Roy, Shalini. 2024. Does nutrition-sensitive social protection protection build longer-term resilience? Experimental evidence from Bangladesh. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2282. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155053

Country/Region

Bangladesh

Keywords

Asia; Southern Asia; Covid-19; Resilience; Shock; Social Protection

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Source

Source record

Project

Gender Equality

Record type

Working Paper

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Journal Article

Educational impacts of an unconditional cash transfer program in Mali

2024Sessou, Fidele Eric; Hidrobo, Melissa; Roy, Shalini; Huybregts, Lieven
Details

Educational impacts of an unconditional cash transfer program in Mali

In rural West Africa, the rate of out-of-school children is high and delayed entry to primary school is common, particularly for girls. Using the randomized roll-out of a large-scale unconditional cash transfer program in Mali, we examine its impact on child schooling by age and sex. The program leads to significant improvements in schooling outcomes for girls, but not boys. Improvements are especially salient among younger (ages 6–9) and older (ages 15–18) girls. Complementary analysis reveals that the program reduces the time younger girls spend in agricultural work at home and the time older girls spend in domestic work as well as self-employment. Households in the program also spend more on education for older girls in terms of school fees, materials, and transport.

Year published

2024

Authors

Sessou, Fidele Eric; Hidrobo, Melissa; Roy, Shalini; Huybregts, Lieven

Citation

Sessou, Fidele Eric; Hidrobo, Melissa; Roy, Shalini; and Huybregts, Lieven. 2024. Educational impacts of an unconditional cash transfer program in Mali. Economics of Education Review 101. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econedurev.2024.102547

Country/Region

Mali

Keywords

Western Africa; Africa; Children; Schools; Education; Girls Education; Gender; Cash Transfers; Labour

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econedurev.2024.102547 Source record

Project

Gender Equality

Record type

Journal Article

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Abstract

Achieving sustainability and scalability of a large-scale prenatal cash and food transfer intervention in Bangladesh

2024Akter, Fahmida; Parvin, Aklima; Roy, Shalini; Frongillo, Edward A.; Leroy, Jef L.; Larson, Leila M.
Details

Achieving sustainability and scalability of a large-scale prenatal cash and food transfer intervention in Bangladesh

Objectives: The WHO (2016) antenatal care guidelines recommend research on alternatives to prenatal energy and protein supplements – such as cash or food distribution. The Bangladesh government is currently implementing the Mother and Child Benefit Programme (MCBP) to improve prenatal nutrition and child health. We conducted implementation research that aimed to understand how the MCBP, and augmented versions of it, 1) stimulated behavior changes, 2) enabled or prevented participants to sustain behavior changes, and 3) achieved conditions required for program scale-up.

Year published

2024

Authors

Akter, Fahmida; Parvin, Aklima; Roy, Shalini; Frongillo, Edward A.; Leroy, Jef L.; Larson, Leila M.

Citation

Akter, Fahmida; Parvin, Aklima; Roy, Shalini; Frongillo, Edward A.; Leroy, Jef L.; and Larson, Leila M. 2024. Achieving sustainability and scalability of a large-scale prenatal cash and food transfer intervention in Bangladesh. Current Developments in Nutrition 8 (Supplement 2): 102923. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cdnut.2024.102923

Country/Region

Bangladesh

Keywords

Asia; Southern Asia; Cash Transfers; Nutrition Education; Sustainability; Women; Pregnancy

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-NC-ND-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cdnut.2024.102923 Source record

Record type

Abstract

Blogs

Tackling gender inequality in a climate-changed world: How agrifood and social protection systems can empower women and girls to build climate resilience
IFPRI Blog
 | 
June 18, 2024

Tackling gender inequality in a climate-changed world: How agrifood and social protection systems can empower women and girls to build climate resilience

By Clara Ceravolo, Ilaria Sisto, Lauren Whitehead, Matthew Walsham, Morane Verhoeven, and Shalini Roy

Five key ways to promote adaptation.

Examining ways to promote mobile money use in refugee-hosting areas in Ethiopia
IFPRI Blog
 | 
September 14, 2022

Examining ways to promote mobile money use in refugee-hosting areas in Ethiopia

By Alan de Brauw and Shalini Roy

The importance of digital financial inclusion.

Making cash transfers more effective in reducing intimate partner violence
IFPRI Blog
 | 
June 24, 2022

Making cash transfers more effective in reducing intimate partner violence

By Shalini Roy, Amber Peterman, and Lucy Billings

A new phase in understanding how such programs can empower women.

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Events

Virtual Event - COVID-19: Emerging problems and potential country-level responses
IFPRI Policy Seminar

 | 

April 30, 2020, 9:00 – 10:15 am

Virtual Event – COVID-19: Emerging problems and potential country-level responses

IFPRI experts examine what to expect, and how developing countries can respond in ways that promote food security, nutrition, and greater equity.

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Seeds of Change Conference
IFPRI at External Event

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April 2 to 4, 2019

Seeds of Change Conference

IFPRI is participating extensively in the Seeds of Change conference— the first international conference on gender equality through agricultural research for development. This interdisciplinary conference brings together researchers and practitioners from diverse fields of social science and agriculture focusing on food/commodity/cash crops, subsistence/semi-subsistence sectors, supply chains, climate, forestry, fisheries, and water management. The conference is jointly funded […]

Leveraging Cash Transfers to Reduce Intimate Partner Violence at Scale (A CSW 63 SIDE EVENT)
Series/Special Event

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March 13, 2019, 11:30 – 1:00 pm

Leveraging Cash Transfers to Reduce Intimate Partner Violence at Scale (A CSW 63 SIDE EVENT)

Over 1.9 billion people benefit from social safety nets around the world, however effects on intra-household dynamics and gender implications of large-scale programming is rarely rigorously evaluated. This event will focus on growing evidence linking cash transfers to intimate partner violence in low- and middle-income countries and features research from the Cash Transfer and Intimate […]

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News

November 05, 2018 | In the News

Cash transfers prove effective in reducing violence against women: IFPRI study (Financial Express)

Financial Express (Bangladesh) reported on the IFPRI study, Transfers, behavior change communication, and intimate partner violence: Post-program evidence from rural Bangladesh, The study found that direct cash transfers coupled with behavior change communication (BCC) can reduce violence against women inflicted by their partners by more than a quarter. Research Fellow Shalini Roy stated, “The study […]

October 22, 2019 | In the News

Cash transfers and intimate partner violence (Agrilinks)

Agrilinks reported on an IFPRI study. The authors identify three policy-relevant knowledge gaps related to the potential of transfer programs to reduce intimate partner violence, drawing on case studies from Bangladesh, Ecuador, and Mali.

February 08, 2019 | In the News

Opinion: Measuring the unintended benefits of a development program (Devex)

Devex published an op-ed by Akhter Ahmed, Melissa Hidrobo, and Shalini Roy about the additional impact development programs may have on wellbeing.  Evaluating the Transfer Modality Research initiative in Bangladesh, research showed that cash transfers and behavior change communications can reduce intimate partner violence and lead to improved nutrition knowledge. 

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