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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.

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Elodie Becquey

Elodie Becquey is a Senior Research Fellow in the Nutrition, Diets, and Health Unit, based in IFPRI’s West and Central Africa office in Senegal. She has over 15 years of research experience in diet, nutrition, and food security in Africa, including countries such as Burkina Faso, Chad, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Mali, and Tanzania.

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Natural Resources and Resilience

Claudia Ringler

Director, Natural Resources and Resilience (NRR)

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Claudia Ringler

Bio

Claudia Ringler is the Unit Director for Natural Resources and Resilience in the Transformation Strategies Department. She coordinates research at the intersection of nature, agriculture, and development for tangible progress toward more equitable and resilient food systems. As co-lead of the CGIAR NEXUS Gains initiative, she drives research on the role of energy in transforming food and water systems and on climate change adaptation and mitigation, as well as water and other natural resource interventions for increased equity and resilience.

Claudia has more than 200 publications in the areas of water and food security and equity in climate resilience, irrigation, and energy systems, developed in collaboration with partners across Africa and Asia. In 2021, she was awarded honorary life memberships by both the International Water Resources Association and the International Association of Agricultural Economics for her lifelong contributions to the fields of water resources economics and agricultural economics, respectively.

Claudia received a PhD in agricultural economics from the Center of Development Research, University of Bonn, and an MA in international development economics from Yale University.

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Biofuels in India: Trading off climate mitigation with water security goals

2025Singh, Vartika; Mishra, Abhijeet; Alam, Mohammad Faiz; Sulser, Timothy B.; Ringler, Claudia
Details

Biofuels in India: Trading off climate mitigation with water security goals

Biofuels are recognized as a renewable alternative to fossil sources of energy like petroleum or gas. Liquid biofuels, such as bioethanol and biodiesel are blended with petrol or diesel and used for road, aviation and marine transport; they are expected to account for 6% of total renewable transportation fuel use by 2030. Biofuels can not only support a country’s mitigation goals; but also reduce the need for foreign exchange and support agricultural growth. In India, 22% of total energy supply is provided by renewables, most of it from biomass for heating; while biofuels account for less than 1% of transportation energy. Over 90% of bioethanol and biodiesel are produced from food crops such as maize, sugarcane, soybeans, and vegetable oils, with sugarcane serving as the primary feedstock. As a signatory to the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), India submitted its Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategy (LT-LEDS) to the UNFCCC in 2022, emphasizing the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the transport sector. Achieving this goal is supported, among others, by India’s biofuel policy of 2018 (modified from the original policy of 2009), which aims to achieve blending targets of 20% for ethanol and 5% for biodiesel by 2025.

Year published

2025

Authors

Singh, Vartika; Mishra, Abhijeet; Alam, Mohammad Faiz; Sulser, Timothy B.; Ringler, Claudia

Citation

Singh, Vartika; Mishra, Abhijeet; Alam, Mohammad Faiz; Sulser, Timothy B.; and Ringler, Claudia. 2025. Biofuels in India: Trading off climate mitigation with water security goals. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/178762

Country/Region

India

Keywords

Asia; Southern Asia; Biofuels; Climate Change Mitigation; Climate Change; Water Security; Natural Resources

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Source

Source record

Record type

Brief

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Journal Article

Does small-scale irrigation affect women’s time allocation? Insights from Ethiopia

2025Lee, Yeyoung; Bryan, Elizabeth; Mason, Nicole M.; Hassen, Ibrahim Worku; Theriault, Veronique; Ringler, Claudia
Details

Does small-scale irrigation affect women’s time allocation? Insights from Ethiopia

Small-scale irrigation (SSI) interventions have received increasing attention as a potential pathway for women’s empowerment in sub-Saharan Africa. One key aspect of women’s empowerment that SSI can influence is women’s time burden. Hypothesized benefits of SSI for women are less energy exertion and reduced labor in agriculture. Yet, these hypotheses have not been tested empirically. We explore how household adoption of different SSI technologies affects the time allocation of women in the household, using two rounds of intrahousehold panel survey data from Ethiopia. Two different approaches are used to address potential endogeneity issues related to time-constant and time-varying factors that may be correlated with both SSI and time use: an instrumental variables-correlated random effects approach and a fractional multinomial logit-correlated random effects with control function approach. The results suggest that household use of SSI in general is associated with an increase in women’s leisure time. The results further suggest that household use of motor pumps is associated with an increase in women’s leisure time and reductions in the time they spend on farming and personal care. Given that women often provide the labor for irrigation using manual, labor-intensive methods, such as watering cans, buckets, or hand- or foot-powered treadle pumps, the results suggest that SSI using motorized methods has the potential to free up women’s time in farming and enable more leisure time. These findings have broad implications for women’s empowerment and labor allocation. Future research using new and more comprehensive data could explore the mechanisms for the findings in this study and determine if SSI enables women to improve their ability to allocate their time to activities they prefer.

Year published

2025

Authors

Lee, Yeyoung; Bryan, Elizabeth; Mason, Nicole M.; Hassen, Ibrahim Worku; Theriault, Veronique; Ringler, Claudia

Citation

Lee, Yeyoung; Bryan, Elizabeth; Mason, Nicole M.; Hassen, Ibrahim Worku; Theriault, Veronique; and Ringler, Claudia. 2025. Does small-scale irrigation affect women’s time allocation? Insights from Ethiopia. World Development 196(December 2025): 107106. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2025.107106

Country/Region

Ethiopia

Keywords

Africa; Eastern Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Small-scale Irrigation; Women; Time Use Patterns; Women’s Empowerment; Gender; Logit Analysis; Water Management; Free Time

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2025.107106 Source record

Project

Water, Land and Ecosystems

Record type

Journal Article

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Working Paper

Bridging the gap: How human-centered design can help unlock bottlenecks in the diffusion of small-scale irrigation in Nigeria

2025
Balana, Bedru; Abba, Aminu; Iraoya, Augustine Okhale; Takasai, Musa Tukur; Yakasai, Bello; Abdullahi, Kabiru; Shuaibu, Ahmed Usman; Musa, Nurudden Muhammad; Kirui, Oliver K.; Edeh, Hyacinth O.
…more Ringler, Claudia
Details

Bridging the gap: How human-centered design can help unlock bottlenecks in the diffusion of small-scale irrigation in Nigeria

Ample evidence shows that small-scale irrigation (SSI) has positive impacts on agricultural productivity, poverty reduction, climate resilience and household food security, nutrition. Despite this, adoption of SSI has remained low in sub-Saharan Africa, including Nigeria, where previous research suggests potential for adoption is largest. Factors such as high cost of technologies, farmers’ risk behavior, lack of incentives, and lack of access to finance and capacity gaps have often been noted as key constraints limiting the adoption/scaling of SSI among smallholders. However, in an environment with low overall levels of use, it is important to not only focus on the challenges experienced by smallholder farmers, but also on those of key intermediary actors—specifically government, irrigation equipment distributors, and finance institutions—that are critical for a supportive enabling environment of SSI technology diffusion. To understand the constraints these groups encounter and propose innovative policy, financial, and supply chain solutions, we conducted a series of human-centered design (HCD) workshops in three locations in Nigeria. Key solutions proposed during nine workshops include the need for cross-sector coordination and policy harmonization, improved data and digital systems and platforms, customized financial products and risk-sharing options for SSI, capacity-sharing for extension services, and specific strategies to support women farmers so that they benefit equally.

Year published

2025

Authors

Balana, Bedru; Abba, Aminu; Iraoya, Augustine Okhale; Takasai, Musa Tukur; Yakasai, Bello; Abdullahi, Kabiru; Shuaibu, Ahmed Usman; Musa, Nurudden Muhammad; Kirui, Oliver K.; Edeh, Hyacinth O.; Ringler, Claudia

Citation

Balana, Bedru; Abba, Aminu; Iraoya, Augustine Okhale; Takasai, Musa Tukur; Yakasai, Bello; et al. 2025. Bridging the gap: How human-centered design can help unlock bottlenecks in the diffusion of small-scale irrigation in Nigeria. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2380. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/178299

Country/Region

Nigeria

Keywords

Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Western Africa; Irrigation; Small-scale Irrigation; Government; Financial Institutions; Irrigation Equipment; Design

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Source

Source record

Record type

Working Paper

Events

Shaping Food Policy in a Changing World: Research Priorities for Greater Impact
IFPRI Policy Seminar

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December 15, 2025, 9:00 – 4:00 pm

Shaping Food Policy in a Changing World: Research Priorities for Greater Impact

In today’s fast-changing world and evolving food systems, the need for evidence-based food policy has never been more urgent – demanding research that is timely, inclusive, and tailored to context. Reliable data and rigorous analysis are essential, but research must also evolve – and become more timely, more relevant, and more inclusive of diverse voices […]

Africa Food Systems Forum 2025 Summit
IFPRI at External Event

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August 31 to September 5, 2025

Africa Food Systems Forum 2025 Summit

The Africa Food Systems Forum will host its annual summit in Dakar, Senegal, from August 31 to September 5, 2025. Africa’s Food Systems Forum, formerly AGRF, is the world’s premier forum for African agriculture and food systems, bringing together stakeholders to take practical actions and share lessons that will move African food systems forward. Africa […]

Long-term changes in Uganda’s soil health conditions and women’s responses to land degradation: A contribution to the African Fertilizer and Soil Health Action Plan 2023-2033
IFPRI Program/Country Event

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June 11, 2025, 2:00 – 5:00 pm

Long-term changes in Uganda’s soil health conditions and women’s responses to land degradation: A contribution to the African Fertilizer and Soil Health Action Plan 2023-2033

IFPRI in collaboration with Uganda’s National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO), an autonomous public research agency under the auspices of the Ministry of Agricture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, has collected soil health data at plot level together with intra-household socioeconomic data and laboratory analyses of soil samples since 2003. The most recent data collection took place […]

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News

September 03, 2025 | Press Release

Celebrating 50 Years of Impact and Informing Food Policies Across Africa

IFPRI marks its 50th anniversary with a special event at the Africa Food Systems Forum in Dakar.

September 02, 2025 | Press Release

Launch of IFPRI’s 2025 Global Food Policy Report at Africa Food Systems Forum

IFPRI and AGRA will host a high-level Africa launch of IFPRI’s 2025 GFPR, “Food Policy: Lessons and Priorities for a Changing World,” at AFSF, highlighting linkages to the new CAADP agenda.

August 29, 2025 | Press Release

IFPRI at Africa Food Systems Forum 2025

IFPRI’s delegation at AFSF 2025—including Director General and senior researchers—will participate in plenary sessions, high-level panels, side and special events as part of the wider CGIAR delegation at AFSF.

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