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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. 

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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

Development Strategies and Governance

Mateusz Filipski

Nonresident Fellow

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Bio

Mateusz J. Filipski is a Non-Resident Fellow in the Development Strategies and Governance Unit and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics at the University of Georgia. He was formerly a Research Fellow at IFPRI’s Washington, DC, office. His research is focused primarily on development economics and impact evaluation.

Prior to joining IFPRI, Mateusz worked as a Postdoctoral Scholar at the University of California, Davis, and as a consultant for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). He holds a bachelor’s in Engineering and a master’s degree from the French grande école Agro-ParisTech, and a PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from UC Davis.

Personal Website

Google Profile

Book (Beyond Experiments in Development Economics)

Publications

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Book Chapter

Regional variations in rural livelihoods: Challenges and opportunities

2024Belton, Ben; Filipski, Mateusz; Lambrecht, Isabel B.; Fang, Peixun
Details

Regional variations in rural livelihoods: Challenges and opportunities

Rural livelihoods in Myanmar are embedded in regional contexts that vary widely in terms of physical geography, climate and agroecology, local resource base, agrarian structure, infrastructure provision, proximity to urban areas and neighboring countries, social networks, institutions, and ethnicities. The composition of livelihoods in each administrative and geographic zone of the country reflects these diverse contexts. Marked variations in livelihood patterns are evident at multiple scales, from the zone or region down to township and village level, so that the composition of livelihoods in villages close to one another sometimes varies widely. Despite the high level of place-based specificity in the composition of livelihoods, many broad similarities and common trends shape livelihoods at subnational and national levels. These include generally low levels of agricultural productivity relative to other countries in the region in terms of both land and labor; high rates of landlessness, legacies of land confiscation, and unresolved struggles over land rights and access; and generally poor public infrastructure and services—including electricity, roads, schools, health services, and rural credit—though these were improving rapidly in many places before 2020; relatively low levels of diversification and capital in the rural nonfarm economy; high rates of international and domestic outmigration; and histories of ethnopolitical conflict and insecurity.

Year published

2024

Authors

Belton, Ben; Filipski, Mateusz; Lambrecht, Isabel B.; Fang, Peixun

Citation

Belton, Ben; Filipski, Mateusz; Lambrecht, Isabel; and Fang, Peixun. 2024. Regional variations in rural livelihoods: Challenges and opportunities. In Myanmar’s agrifood system: Historical development, recent shocks, future opportunities. Boughton, Duncan; Belton, Ben; Lambrecht, Isabel B.; Masias, Ian; and Minten, Bart (Eds.). Chapter 18, Pp. 491-512. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155200

Country/Region

Myanmar

Keywords

South-eastern Asia; Rural Livelihoods; Agricultural Productivity; Land Rights; Infrastructure; Household Surveys; Agroecology

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Source

Source record

Record type

Book Chapter

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Book Chapter

Income diversification and the rural nonfarm economy

2024Paudel, Susan; Filipski, Mateusz; Minten, Bart
Details

Income diversification and the rural nonfarm economy

The rapid transformation of the rural sector between 2011 and 2021 has been well-documented in relation to farming and included profound changes in crops grown, farming practices, markets, and value chains. This transformation has been described in this volume, as well as in Belton and Filipski (2019), Filipski et al. (2020), Boughton et al. (2018), and World Bank (2017). However, this period also witnessed a diversification of activities away from agriculture, with incomes shifting away from reliance on subsistence farming and agriculture in general. The contributions of wage work and rural nonfarm businesses are growing in importance as the rural sector moves beyond an agrarian model in which primary agricultural production is the dominant source of wealth. Though the general equilibrium analysis from Chapter 2 shows that agriculture remains a major driver of economic activity, a micro-level analysis finds that activities either downstream in the food value chain or outside of the food system entirely are now responsible for large shares of rural incomes.

Year published

2024

Authors

Paudel, Susan; Filipski, Mateusz; Minten, Bart

Citation

Paudel, Susan; Filipski, Mateusz; and Minten, Bart. 2024. Income diversification and the rural nonfarm economy. In Myanmar’s agrifood system: Historical development, recent shocks, future opportunities. Boughton, Duncan; Belton, Ben; Lambrecht, Isabel B.; Masias, Ian; and Minten, Bart (Eds.). Chapter 16, Pp. 439-466. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155198

Country/Region

Myanmar

Keywords

South-eastern Asia; Income; Rural Areas; Nonfarm Income; Economic Situation; Diversification

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Source

Source record

Record type

Book Chapter

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Book Chapter

Agricultural mechanization: Drivers and characteristics

2024Belton, Ben; Win, Myat Thida; Zhang, Xiaobo; Filipski, Mateusz; Takeshima, Hiroyuki; Masias, Ian
Details

Agricultural mechanization: Drivers and characteristics

Widespread agricultural mechanization is a very recent phenomenon in Myanmar. In 2010, just 0.5 percent of farm households in the Delta used combine harvesters, and only 6 percent used threshers. A study of farm production economics in the country’s main agricultural zones in 2013/14 found that only 1 percent of paddy-cultivating households used combine harvesters. This was attributed to a combination of low wages and surplus labor in rural areas, poor infrastructure, a poor regulatory environment, and a lack of access to long-term capital among farmers. However, Myanmar’s policy reforms and reintegration into regional and global markets between 2011 and 2020 contributed to increasingly dynamic conditions, including economic growth averaging 7 percent per year (ADB 2018), accelerating out-migration from rural areas, and rapid rural transformation. This context gave rise to rapid and widespread agricultural mechanization. This chapter compares data from two pairs of complementary surveys to assess the effects of these economic changes on the uptake of agricultural mechanization. We combine demand-side (farm household) and supply-side (agricultural machinery retailer) surveys implemented between 2016 and 2018 across two major agroecological zones—a deltaic rice-growing environment (the Delta) and a rainfed semiarid zone (the Dry Zone). This approach allows for triangulation of results and captures variations in mechanization across geographies. In addition, we use data from multiple rounds of rapid assessments to evaluate the impacts of COVID-19 and other recent shocks.

Year published

2024

Authors

Belton, Ben; Win, Myat Thida; Zhang, Xiaobo; Filipski, Mateusz; Takeshima, Hiroyuki; Masias, Ian

Citation

Belton, Ben; Win, Myat Thida; Zhang, Xiaobo; Filipski, Mateusz; Takeshima, Hiroyuki; and Masias, Ian. 2024. Agricultural mechanization: Drivers and characteristics. In Myanmar’s agrifood system: Historical development, recent shocks, future opportunities, Duncan Boughton, Ben Belton, Isabel Lambrecht, and Bart Minten, eds. Chapter 7, Pp. 171-200. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155170

Country/Region

Myanmar

Keywords

Asia; South-eastern Asia; Agricultural Mechanization; Agrifood Systems; Development; Economic Shock; Governance

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Source

Source record

Record type

Book Chapter

Blogs

How do earthquakes shape economic behavior?
IFPRI Blog
 | 
November 14, 2019

How do earthquakes shape economic behavior?

By Kevin Chen, Mateusz Filipski, and Xiaobo Zhang

Research shows how a disaster can impact an economy beyond the simple rebuilding process. The Sichuan earthquake induced a lifestyle shift in households toward greater spending and shifted the economy away from industrial production.

World Refugee Day: Rohingya in Bangladesh camp display entrepreneurial spark
IFPRI Blog
 | 
June 19, 2018

World Refugee Day: Rohingya in Bangladesh camp display entrepreneurial spark

By Mateusz Filipski

A variety of small businesses spring up to serve an influx of half a million refugees.

What Rwanda and Uganda can teach us about the benefits of hosting refugees
IFPRI Blog
 | 
June 19, 2017

What Rwanda and Uganda can teach us about the benefits of hosting refugees

By Mateusz Filipski

Research shows that with proper support, refugees can provide an economic boon to surrounding communities.

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Events

The Future of Work in Agriculture
IFPRI at External Event

 | 

March 19 to 20, 2019

The Future of Work in Agriculture

IFPRI is participating in the IFAD, UC Davis, World Bank Group co-organized conference on the future of work in agriculture. As a major employer, agriculture has been at the center of discussions about poverty reduction and development. However, as countries develop, and people spend more income on higher valued, non-traditional food and non-food items, agriculture’s […]

Policy reform, agricultural trade, and economic growth in Myanmar
IFPRI Policy Seminar

 | 

August 31, 2016, 4:15 – 5:45 pm

Policy reform, agricultural trade, and economic growth in Myanmar

Speaker: Panelists: Chairperson: Closing Remarks: In the wake of the recent political transition in Myanmar, the country faces major challenges to accelerated agricultural development and economic growth, including massive needs for investments in agricultural research, extension, and irrigation. Many opportunities are also opening up. Trade with China has grown rapidly in the past five years […]

News

November 17, 2017 | In the News

New Aquaculture Economy Emerged on Rising Fish Demand (Myanmar Times)

Myanmar Times published an article on the country’s emerging aquaculture economy, on the back of rising fish demand.

June 20, 2017 | In the News

Africa News Tonight (Voice of America)

Africa News Tonight, a daily news radio program of Voice of America, interviewed IFPRI research fellow Mateusz Filipski for World Refugee Day. Dr. Filipski spoke about his research on the benefits of hosting refugees in Rwanda and Uganda. Refugees are contributing to their host economies through work opportunities and spending in local businesses.

November 18, 2016 | In the News

Uganda Refugees Are Actually Boosting Economy (Voice of America)

A study co-authored by IFPRI’s Research Fellow Mateusz Filipski on the economic impact of refugees was covered by Voice of America. The study found that refugees can actually have a positive economic impact on their host communities. According to the article, “While many think of refugees as a drag on a nation’s economy, a United […]

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Research

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