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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

Liangzhi You

Liangzhi You is a Senior Research Fellow and theme leader in the Foresight and Policy Modeling Unit, based in Washington, DC. His research focuses on climate resilience, spatial data and analytics, agroecosystems, and agricultural science policy. Gridded crop production data of the world (SPAM) and the agricultural technology evaluation model (DREAM) are among his research contributions. 

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.

IFPRI Regional Programs

IFPRI Country Programs

Research by country and region

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partnerships

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) works with partners from around the world to address several challenges we face today. These challenges are categorized into five divisions: Global Health, Global Development Division; Global Growth & Opportunity Division; United States Division; and Global Policy & Advocacy Division. BMGF seeks to understand inequalities throughout the world and works to create change through its influence and investments.

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Projects

Strengthening the Economic Evaluation of Strategies for Nutrition (SEEMS-Nutrition)

Strengthening the Economic Evaluation of Strategies for Nutrition (SEEMS-Nutrition)

SEEMS-Nutrition supports the scaling up of future solutions to enhance and sustain nutritious food systems in a rapidly evolving environment of decreasing child and maternal……

South Asia Nutrition Knowledge Initiative (SANI)

South Asia Nutrition Knowledge Initiative (SANI)

The South Asia Nutrition Knowledge Initiative (SANI), aims to bring data and evidence to policy and program communities for supporting decision-making for optimal nutrition for……

Political Economy of Large-Scale Food Fortification

Political Economy of Large-Scale Food Fortification

Despite broad acknowledgement by the research community that large-scale food fortification (LSFF) is a cost-effective intervention to address micronutrient deficiencies, the uptake and implementation of……

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Publications

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Journal Article

Adapting the women’s empowerment in nutrition index: Lessons from Kenya

2025Lentz, Erin; Jensen, Nathan; Lepariyo, Watson; Narayanan, Sudha; Bageant, Elizabeth
Details

Adapting the women’s empowerment in nutrition index: Lessons from Kenya

Women face a disproportionate burden of malnutrition and food insecurity. Research has shown that women’s empowerment can buffer women against nutritional problems. This paper contributes to ongoing efforts to measure women’s empowerment that are both context-sensitive and universal, focusing on the recently developed Women’s Empowerment in Nutrition Index (WENI). Earlier research has shown it is both a valid construct and positively related to dietary and nutritional outcomes of women in South Asia. We establish that WENI is generalizable to agropastoral and pastoral Kenya, an area with substantially different livelihoods, food system, norms, and institutions than South Asia. We find that a locally contextualized WENI is strongly associated with women’s body mass index and dietary diversity as well as household level food insecurity. We also present findings for two shorter variations of WENI: an abbreviated WENI (A-WENI) and a cross context WENI (CC-WENI). A-WENI contains a small subset of WENI indicators identified using machine learning with South Asian data and therefore is context-specific. CC-WENI does not contain indicators specific to the validation context. We find that they perform comparably well with caveats. Thus, as use of WENI expands we recommend adapting WENI for in-depth analyses of women’s nutritional empowerment; using CC-WENI for cross-context comparisons; and using A-WENI for rapid appraisals of community level progress in a given context.

Year published

2025

Authors

Lentz, Erin; Jensen, Nathan; Lepariyo, Watson; Narayanan, Sudha; Bageant, Elizabeth

Citation

Lentz, Erin; Jensen, Nathan; Lepariyo, Watson; Narayanan, Sudha; and Bageant, Elizabeth. 2024. Adapting the women’s empowerment in nutrition index: Lessons from Kenya. World Development 188: 106887. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106887

Country/Region

Kenya

Keywords

Africa; Eastern Africa; Women’s Empowerment; Malnutrition; Food Security; Livelihoods; Food Systems; Indicators

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106887 Source record

Project

Livestock

Record type

Journal Article

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Brief

Gender and age employment gaps within agrifood value chains in Bangladesh and Uganda

2024Ambler, Kate; Bloem, Jeffrey R.; Wagner, Julia
Details

Gender and age employment gaps within agrifood value chains in Bangladesh and Uganda

Using data collected with a novel sampling approach for agrifood value chains in Bangladesh (rice and potato) and Uganda (arabica coffee and soybean), this study documented meaningful gender and age employment gaps within intermediary sections of the value chains, which include trading , processing, and wholesaling activities. While agrifood value chains have potential to generate new jobs and close gaps for both women’s and youth employment in low- and middle-income countries, the study identifies large gender gaps in both operators of intermediary firms and those employed by these firms, as well as an age gap, with few youth operating intermediary firms. The brief offers recommendations for addressing systemic barriers that contribute to gender and age gaps in this “hidden middle” of agrifood value chains.

Year published

2024

Authors

Ambler, Kate; Bloem, Jeffrey R.; Wagner, Julia

Citation

Ambler, Kate; Bloem, Jeffrey R.; and Wagner, Julia. 2024. Gender and age employment gaps within agrifood value chains in Bangladesh and Uganda. IFPRI Issue Brief December 2024. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/162977

Country/Region

Bangladesh; Uganda

Keywords

Asia; Africa; Southern Asia; Eastern Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Gender; Employment; Agrifood Systems; Agricultural Value Chains; Youth Employment

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Source

Source record

Project

Rethinking Food Markets

Record type

Brief

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Journal Article

Defining and measuring policy coherence for food system transformation: A scoping review

2024Dewi, Deviana; Aytekin, Destan; Schneider, Kate R.; Covic, Namukolo; Fanzo, Jessica; Nordhagen, Stella; Resnick, Danielle
Details

Defining and measuring policy coherence for food system transformation: A scoping review

Changes in food systems—across multiple sectors and through all levels of government—are essential for meeting many of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and other global environmental and health targets. Steering food systems towards common outcomes and ensuring that actions in one area do not undermine progress in another requires policy coherence. This scoping review examines how policy coherence has been broadly defined and measured in areas related to food system transformation to inform conceptualization, definition, and measurement specific to food systems transformation and provide insights for policy and program implementation. We reviewed literature published from January 2000 to December 2022 and identified 47 studies meeting the inclusion criteria. Results show that common features of definitions of policy coherence relevant for food systems are: an emphasis on minimizing tradeoffs and maximizing synergies; policy integration within different areas of government and food systems or across scales (horizontal or vertical coherence); alignment of objectives, interventions, and indicators within a given policy area; and complementarity and consistency of actions and goals within or across sectors of food systems. Measurement methods to date are mainly limited to qualitative policy document review and participatory assessment, with no examples of application at scale. This paper provides a first step towards a definition and measurement approach for policy coherence that can fill this important data gap in monitoring the governance of food systems transformation and synthesizes evidence to guide actions towards greater policy coherence in governing national food systems.

Year published

2024

Authors

Dewi, Deviana; Aytekin, Destan; Schneider, Kate R.; Covic, Namukolo; Fanzo, Jessica; Nordhagen, Stella; Resnick, Danielle

Citation

Dewi, Deviana; Aytekin, Destan; Schneider, Kate R.; Covic, Namukolo; Fanzo, Jessica; Nordhagen, Stella; and Resnick, Danielle. 2024. Defining and measuring policy coherence for food system transformation: A scoping review. World Food Security 43: 100803. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gfs.2024.100803

Keywords

Food Systems; Sustainable Development Goals; Policies; Literature Reviews

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Links

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gfs.2024.100803 Source record

Record type

Journal Article

Events

Release of the Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) for Ghana
IFPRI Program/Country Event

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August 24, 2023, 5:30 – 7:00 am

Release of the Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) for Ghana

Event: August 24, 2023 – 5:30 AM- 7:00 AM EDT. IFPRI is co-hosting the release of the Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) for Ghana under the Nexus Project in partnership with the Ghana Statistical Service and the Institute for Statistical, Social and Economic Research.

A Decade of the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI): Lessons from Using Empowerment Metrics
IFPRI Policy Seminar

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February 16, 2022, 9:30 – 11:00 am

A Decade of the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI): Lessons from Using Empowerment Metrics

Virtual Event: Feb 16, 2022 – 09:30 AM to 11:00 AM EST. This Special Event will reflect on what has been accomplished and learned by applying WEAI and pro-WEAI in diverse contexts.

Tackling child undernutrition at scale: Insights from national and subnational success cases
IFPRI Policy Seminar

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April 1, 2021, 9:30 – 11:00 am

Tackling child undernutrition at scale: Insights from national and subnational success cases

Virtual Event: APR 1, 2021 – 09:30 AM TO 11:00 AM EDT. Lessons from these deep research programs offer hope that big change is possible and provide specific direction for countries striving to accelerate progress on nutrition

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Blogs

Revisiting development strategies under climate uncertainty: Insights from Malawi
IFPRI Blog
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July 19, 2024

Revisiting development strategies under climate uncertainty: Insights from Malawi

By Askar Mukashov and Eleanor Jones

Does the threat of climate change significantly undermine strategies focusing on agriculture?

Evaluating impacts: Lessons from food systems interventions across Africa and Asia
IFPRI Blog
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July 16, 2024

Evaluating impacts: Lessons from food systems interventions across Africa and Asia

By Jef L. Leroy, Lynnette Neufeld, Stella Nordhagen, and Sydney Honeycutt

Transforming food systems is promising but complex, requiring strong evidence and rigorous evaluations to ensure effective interventions.

Adapt, assess, progress: Integrating measures of women’s empowerment into rural development projects
IFPRI Blog
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May 13, 2024

Adapt, assess, progress: Integrating measures of women’s empowerment into rural development projects

By Carlo Azzarri, Sedi-Anne Boukaka, Jessica Heckert, Ruth Meinzen-Dick, Greg Seymour, and Sara Savastano

A new tool developed by IFPRI and IFAD.

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