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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.

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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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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Innovation Policy and Scaling

Judy Chambers

Director – Program for Biosafety Systems

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Bio

Judith Chambers is the Director for the Program for Biosafety Systems in the Innovation Policy and Scaling Unit. Her international team supports interested partner countries in Africa and Asia on the technical development and implementation of evidence-based biosafety systems and independent decision-making for the use of precision genetics to support innovative agriculture research and products.

Dr. Chambers began her professional journey with a PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Pennsylvania where she studied the molecular action of various animal viruses related to HIV. Her postdoctoral studies were conducted at an entrepreneurial biotech company, where she focused on agriculture applications and specifically on the molecular characterization of Bt genes (CryIF) for insect pest control. For the next two decades, she served in various public and private sector positions where she developed and managed initiatives to ensure that the opportunities of biotechnology could be applied to the agricultural issues facing many developing countries. She served as the Senior Biotechnology Advisor at USAID and co-developed the first public-private sector initiative on agriculture biotechnology to support developing country agriculture needs. At a former private agriculture biotechnology company, she served as Director for International Government Affairs and supported the company’s philanthropic efforts to share its proprietary technology with resource poor, small-scale farmers who work every day to bridge the food security gap.

Dr. Chambers has devoted her career to ensuring that the technical and policy systems are in place to expand farmer choice and technology access. Her long history of involvement with agriculture biotechnology and development has provided her with a reflective global insight on how evidence-based decision-making supports agricultural genetic innovations on behalf of resource poor farmers and consumers.

Publications

Publications

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Working Paper

Assessing the development impacts of bio-innovations: The case of genetically modified maize and cassava in Tanzania

2022Benfica, Rui; Zambrano, Patricia; Chambers, Judith A.; Falck-Zepeda, José Benjamin
Details

Assessing the development impacts of bio-innovations: The case of genetically modified maize and cassava in Tanzania

Tanzania’s agriculture faces persistent low crop productivity due to endogenous and exogenous factors, particularly low and unpredictable rainfall, and the incidence of pests. To address these challenges, the government and partners are making efforts to develop and deploy Genetically Modified (GM) Maize varieties with drought tolerance and insect resistant traits (WEMA), and Cassava Brown Streak Disease (CBSD) resistant varieties. This analysis overcomes limitations from earlier assessments of the impacts of those GM crops by accounting for trade-offs in resource competition and considering the indirect effects of adoption and yield gains from GM maize and cassava varieties on the broader economy, the Agri-Food System (AFS), and on household level outcomes. It extends the BioRAPP analysis to an ex-ante economywide framework. We reveal several findings. First, GM maize and cassava (individually and jointly) have positive impacts in the economy, the AFS, and the poverty, particularly in rural areas and among the poorest households. Second, given its relatively greater relevance in output and employment, and the stronger linkages in the AFS, the effects of GM maize on GDP and AFS growth, and poverty is relatively stronger than those from GM cassava. Third, as expected, relatively greater effects are found in higher adoption and high yield gains scenarios, and, in each scenario, the effects on the poorest households are greater than that for the higher quintiles. Furthermore, differential impact across scenarios is also greater amongst the poorest, while the differences are minimal for the top quintile. Finally, the high variation of results across scenarios, and the significant effects of the high adoption/high yield change scenario, suggest that efforts will be critical to ensure the realization of the maximization of adoption rates while ensuring the materialization of the yield growth potential of the GM varieties through the efficient use of technical recommendations on crop production management, and the introduction of the right investments and policy incentives.

Year published

2022

Authors

Benfica, Rui; Zambrano, Patricia; Chambers, Judith A.; Falck-Zepeda, José Benjamin

Citation

Benfica, Rui; Zambrano, Patricia; Chambers, Judith A.; and Falck-Zepeda, José Benjamin. 2022. Assessing the development impacts of bio-innovations: The case of genetically modified maize and cassava in Tanzania. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2107. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). https://doi.org/10.2499/p15738coll2.135055

Keywords

Tanzania; Eastern Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Africa; Models; Agricultural Products; Policies; Poverty Alleviation; Maize; Computable General Equilibrium Models; Innovation Adoption; Agrifood Systems; Cassava; Yields; Genetically Modified Organisms

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Links

https://doi.org/10.2499/p15738coll2.135055 Source record

Project

Policies, Institutions, and Markets

Record type

Working Paper

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Working Paper

Insect-resistant cowpea in Nigeria: An ex ante economic assessment of a crop improvement initiative

2019Phillip, Dayo; Nin-Pratt, Alejandro; Zambrano, Patricia; Wood-Sichra, Ulrike; Kato, Edward; Komen, John; Hanson, Hillary; Falck-Zepeda, José B.; Chambers, Judith A.
Details

Insect-resistant cowpea in Nigeria: An ex ante economic assessment of a crop improvement initiative

Since oil prices’ decline in 2014, agriculture has received renewed interest in Nigeria as a key sector for achieving sustainable growth and generating foreign exchange. One of the identified obstacles to achieving these goals is the need to improve agricultural productivity. Cowpea is one of the priority crops identified for productivity improvement. Currently cowpea yields are below 900 kg/ha, but it has been shown that with the right technology, these yields could potentially double. One of the main biotic constraints for cowpea is the infestation of the insect pod borer (Maruca Vitrata). No conventional variety has been developed to resist this pest, but with the use of biotechnology and the sustained collaboration of national and international partners over many years, there is now a genetically modified pod-borer-resistant (or more generally insect-resistant) cowpea. This paper estimates the potential economic benefits of adopting this new technology and the cost that Nigeria will incur if this adoption is delayed. The analysis is conducted using an economic surplus partial equilibrium model run with the newly developed DREAMpy software, data drawn from the Nigeria General Household Survey 2015–2016, estimations using these data, and other local sources. The estimations show that if the insect-resistant cowpea is planted in 2020, the net present-value benefits for producers and consumers would be around US$350 million, 70 percent of which would be accrued by producers. The distribution of benefits by region show that Sudan-Sahel will accrue the most benefits, given the relative concentration of cowpea in this region and the estimated higher adoption rates and yield changes. Almost half of producers’ total benefit will go to large producers, who represent only 20 percent of all cowpea producers, while small producers, representing half of all cowpea producers, will receive 24 percent of the benefit. Additionally, the analysis shows that a five-year regulatory delay will decrease the estimated benefits by around 35 percent. While Nigeria already has in place a competent biosafety system that will most likely ensure that these regulatory delays will not materialize, these estimations highlight the importance of having an evidence-based, efficient, predictable, and transparent regulatory system to ensure that the expected economic benefits are realized.

Year published

2019

Authors

Phillip, Dayo; Nin-Pratt, Alejandro; Zambrano, Patricia; Wood-Sichra, Ulrike; Kato, Edward; Komen, John; Hanson, Hillary; Falck-Zepeda, José B.; Chambers, Judith A.

Citation

Phillip, Dayo; Nin-Pratt, Alejandro; Zambrano, Patricia; Wood-Sichra, Ulrike; Kato, Edward; Komen, John; Hanson, Hillary; Falck-Zepeda, José Benjamin; and Chambers, Judy A. 2019. Insect-resistant cowpea in Nigeria: An ex ante economic assessment of a crop improvement initiative. IFPRI Discussion Paper 1896. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

Country/Region

Nigeria

Keywords

Africa; Western Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Pod Borer; Models; Pest Resistance; Cowpeas; Crops; Technology; Insecticide Resistance; Genetically Modified Foods; Pesticides; Economic Models; Genetically Modified Organisms

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Links

https://doi.org/10.2499/p15738coll2.133541 Source record

Project

Policies, Institutions, and Markets

Record type

Working Paper

Resource thumbnail

Working Paper

bEcon 4 Africa: An overview of the literature on the economic assessment of GE crops in the continent, 1996-2016

2019Zambrano, Patricia; Paul, Namita; Chambers, Judith A.; Falck-Zepeda, José B.; Hanson, Hillary
Details

bEcon 4 Africa: An overview of the literature on the economic assessment of GE crops in the continent, 1996-2016

The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) published the first method-focused assessment of the applied economic literature about the ex ante and ex post impacts of genetically engineered crops in developing countries in 2009. The overall findings have since been documented by other authors and have been the subject of several other studies and meta-analyses. Of the 154 papers analyzed in the cited IFPRI 2009 publications, only 25 were focused on Africa. Ten years later, this paper shows that the number of publications for Africa has nearly tripled, reaching a total of 72 publications. We gathered, classified, and reviewed all 72 Africa-focused publications. Most of the papers continue to focus on South Africa, an early adopter of the technology and, until 2007, the only African country that had commercialized GE crops. Today, even after the commercialization of insect resistant crops in Burkina Faso, Egypt, and Sudan, and the recent approval for commercialization of insect resistant cotton in Nigeria and Ethiopia, South Africa continues to be the most represented country in the literature and is the focus of 30 of the 72 publications. Nevertheless, a shift is occurring. Whereas only 4 African countries were represented in 2006, there are now 24. Additionally, the crop-focus of this literature has also expanded from mainly cotton to include a wider variety of crop/technologies, such as bacillus thuringiensis (Bt)/nutritionally enhanced banana, Bt tomato, and drought-resistant maize, among others. In addition to documenting and analyzing this Africa-focused literature, this paper documents a total of 353 performance indicators related to the actual or projected changes in yields, gross income, and input use contained in the papers focus of this review. A summary of these performance indicators has also been compiled as a searchable database available to all potential users, including practitioners, interested decision and policy makers, as well as businesses and donors not only to facilitate further research, but also as reference to advance specific GE policies, and to increase awareness related to GE technology performance.

Year published

2019

Authors

Zambrano, Patricia; Paul, Namita; Chambers, Judith A.; Falck-Zepeda, José B.; Hanson, Hillary

Citation

Zambrano, Patricia; Paul, Namita; Chambers, Judith A.; Falck-Zepeda, José Benjamin; and Hanson, Hillary. 2019. bEcon 4 Africa: An overview of the literature on the economic assessment of GE crops in the continent, 1996-2016. IFPRI Discussion Paper 1841. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

Keywords

Biotechnology; Economic Analysis; Technology; Genetically Engineered Crops; Literature Reviews; Genetically Modified Organisms

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Links

https://doi.org/10.2499/p15738coll2.133275 Source record

Project

Policies, Institutions, and Markets

Record type

Working Paper

Events

2018 International Consortium on Applied Bioeconomy Research Conference (ICABR)
IFPRI at External Event

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June 12 to 15, 2018

2018 International Consortium on Applied Bioeconomy Research Conference (ICABR)

IFPRI is participating extensively in the International Consortium on Applied Bioeconomy Research (ICABR) conference. Multiple changes in the structure of the food system and agriculture raise new opportunities and challenges for the agricultural sector.  In the developing world, these changes started in Asia and Latin America, and are rapidly emerging in Africa.  Urbanization and increased urban […]

Food Security in a World of Growing Natural Resource Scarcity
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February 12, 2014, 2:00 – 5:00 pm

Food Security in a World of Growing Natural Resource Scarcity

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