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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

Kate Ambler

Kate Amber is a Senior Research Fellow in the Markets, Trade, and Institutions Unit. Kate’s research broadly focuses on interventions that can increase incomes for smallholders and other microenterprises in agrifood value chains, with a specific focus on the inclusion of women. This includes work on programming in fragile settings, innovations in agricultural finance, and regulatory solutions for food safety. 

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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Projects

Advancing Research on Nutrition and Agriculture Phase II (ARENA-II) is a 3-year, multi-country project in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, being implemented from 2017 through 2020. The objective of ARENA is to close important knowledge gaps on the links between nutrition and agriculture, with a particular focus on conducting policy-relevant research at scale and crowding in more research on this issue by creating data sets and analytical tools that can benefit the broader research community.

Research under this project includes studies on the linkages between animal sources foods and stunting, on measuring and improving the affordability of healthy foods and healthy diets, understanding the links between food market quality and food choice, on farming systems and nutrition, and on the impacts of structural transformation on nutrition.

Project duration: 2017 – 2020

Contact

Derek Headey

Donors and funders

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Publications

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Journal Article

Feed handling practices, aflatoxin awareness and children’s milk consumption in the Sidama region of southern Ethiopia

2024Anato, Anchamo; Headey, Derek D.; Hirvonen, Kalle; Pokharel, Ashish; Tessema, Masresha; Wu, Felicia; Baye, Kaleab
Details

Feed handling practices, aflatoxin awareness and children’s milk consumption in the Sidama region of southern Ethiopia

Consumption of milk is linked to improved nutrient intake and reduced risk of child malnutrition in low and middle-income countries. However, these benefits are contingent on the safety and quality of the milk. Milk consumption may alleviate the widespread risk of malnutrition in rural Ethiopia, but milk-borne contaminants may also compromise child health. We aimed to: i) identify the types of dairy feeds used, their storage conditions, and potential risk of aflatoxin contamination; ii) assess stakeholders’ knowledge about aflatoxin contamination along the value chain; and iii) assess parental practices on feeding milk to infants and young children. This qualitative study was conducted in the Sidama region, southern Ethiopia. In-depth interviews (n = 12) and key-informant interviews (n = 18) were conducted with actors along the dairy value chain. Focus-group discussions were conducted with farmers (9FGD/n = 129) and child caregivers (9FGD/n = 122). Study participants were selected to represent a rural-urban gradient, as well as low- and high- dairy cow holdings. We found that while animal-feed processors and their distribution agents had relatively good knowledge about aflatoxin, farmers and retailers did not. Feed storage conditions were poor. Many respondents linked moldy feeds to animal health but not to human health. Farmers’ feed choice was influenced by cost, seasonality, and herd size. Small-holding farmers had limited access to commercial feed. Children’s consumption of milk was limited to skim milk, as butter was extracted and sold for income. The high cost of dairy products also led some parents to dilute skim milk with water before feeding children, compromising the nutritional value and safety of the milk. Our findings underscore the need to address the gaps in aflatoxin and food safety knowledge, improve storage conditions, and ensure the availability of quality feed to increase the sector’s productivity, but most importantly to protect consumers’ health and well-being, especially infants and young children.

Year published

2024

Authors

Anato, Anchamo; Headey, Derek D.; Hirvonen, Kalle; Pokharel, Ashish; Tessema, Masresha; Wu, Felicia; Baye, Kaleab

Citation

Anato, Anchamo; Headey, Derek; Hirvonen, Kalle; Pokharel, Ashish; Tessema, Masresha; Wu, Felicia; and Baye, Kaleab. Feed handling practices, aflatoxin awareness and children’s milk consumption in the Sidama region of southern Ethiopia. One Health 18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.onehlt.2023.100672

Country/Region

Ethiopia

Keywords

Eastern Africa; Feed Safety; Aflatoxins; Child Health; Milk; Consumption

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.onehlt.2023.100672 Source record

Project

Agriculture for Nutrition and Health

Record type

Journal Article

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Journal Article

The glass of milk half-empty? Dairy development and nutrition in low and middle income countries

2024Headey, Derek D.; Alderman, Harold; Hoddinott, John; Narayanan, Sudha
Details

The glass of milk half-empty? Dairy development and nutrition in low and middle income countries

Dairy products have an exceptionally rich nutrient profile and have long been promoted in high income countries to redress child malnutrition. But given all this potential, and the high burden of undernutrition in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), why isn’t dairy consumption more actively promoted in the developing world? In this review we focus on a broadly defined concept of “dairy development” to include production, trade, marketing, regulation, and demand stimulation. We address three key questions. First, how strong is the evidence on the importance of dairy production and consumption for improving nutrition among young children in LMICs? Second, which regions have the lowest consumption of dairy products? Third, what are the supply- and demand-side challenges that prevent LMICs from expanding dairy consumption? We argue that although more nutrition- and consumer-oriented dairy development interventions have tremendous potential to redress undernutrition in LMICs, the pathways for achieving this development are highly context-specific: LMICs with significant agroecological potential for dairy production primarily require institutional solutions for the complex marketing challenges in perishable milk value chains; lower potential LMICs require consumer-oriented trade and industrial approaches to the sector’s development. And all dairy strategies require a stronger focus on cross-cutting issues of nutrition education and demand creation, food safety and quality, gender and inclusiveness, and environmental sustainability and resilience. We conclude our review by emphasizing important areas for research and policy expansion.

Year published

2024

Authors

Headey, Derek D.; Alderman, Harold; Hoddinott, John; Narayanan, Sudha

Citation

Headey, Derek D.; Alderman, Harold; Hoddinott, John; and Narayanan, Sudha. 2024. The glass of milk half-empty? Dairy development and nutrition in low and middle income countries. Food Policy 122(January 2024): 102585. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodpol.2023.102585

Keywords

Child Stunting; Malnutrition; Milk Production; Nutrition Education; Value Chains

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodpol.2023.102585 Source record

Project

Agriculture for Nutrition and Health

Record type

Journal Article

Resource thumbnail

Journal Article

Separability, spillovers, and segmented markets: Evidence from dairy in India

2023Narayanan, Sudha; Negi, Digvijay Singh; Gupta, Tanu
Details

Separability, spillovers, and segmented markets: Evidence from dairy in India

A long history of empirical research has focused on testing whether and when household consumption and production decisions are separable. If markets were perfect, household consumption would be independent of production. In this article, we propose that market channel choice complicates this relationship. Our analysis of household panel data from rural India, focusing on dairy, leads us to four key conclusions. First, milk consumption is correlated with production, and markets are not a complete substitute for household production. Second, a large presence of formal milk buyers in a village is associated with lower milk consumption in dairy households, overturning the positive association of participation in formal value chains with household milk consumption. Third, contrary to expectations, for households that do not own dairy animals and net buyers, the presence of formal value chains remains uncorrelated with milk consumption. Fourth, we infer, test for and find suggestive evidence of segmented milk markets, that is, different types of households participate in different markets for milk that do not seem to interact with each other. Policymakers focused on market development or production-based strategies need to factor in the possibility of market segmentation based on market channels while designing interventions.

Year published

2023

Authors

Narayanan, Sudha; Negi, Digvijay Singh; Gupta, Tanu

Citation

Narayanan, Sudha; Negi, Digvijay S.; and Gupta, Tanu. Separability, spillovers, and segmented markets: Evidence from dairy in India. Agricultural Economics 54(6): 884-899. https://doi.org/10.1111/agec.12786

Country/Region

India

Keywords

Southern Asia; Asia; Milk Production; Value Chains; Data Analysis; Data; Milk; Household Consumption

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1111/agec.12786 Source record

Record type

Journal Article

Blogs

Heat shocks linked to lower maize yields and reduced child height: Evidence from Tanzania
IFPRI Blog
 | 
October 05, 2021

Heat shocks linked to lower maize yields and reduced child height: Evidence from Tanzania

By Steven Block, Beliyou Haile, Liangzhi You, and Derek Headey

The first time such a connection has been established between climate change, agricultural productivity, and health.

1.15 Million Children, 122,472 communities, 57 countries, 30 years: New dataset combines Demographic and Health Surveys with geographic information systems
IFPRI Blog
 | 
February 22, 2021

1.15 Million Children, 122,472 communities, 57 countries, 30 years: New dataset combines Demographic and Health Surveys with geographic information systems

By Zhe Guo, Wahid Quabili, Liangzhi You, and Derek Headey

Making important connections between agriculture, health, and nutrition.

Why 'home garden' projects don’t always work: Insights from Ethiopia
IFPRI Blog
 | 
May 04, 2020

Why ‘home garden’ projects don’t always work: Insights from Ethiopia

By Kalle Hirvonen and Derek Headey

There are valid reasons to doubt whether these programs provide a sustainable and cost-effective way of addressing poor nutrition.

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Events

Food Markets and Nutrition in the Developing World: Results from ARENA II
IFPRI Policy Seminar

 | 

March 18, 2019, 12:15 – 1:45 pm

Food Markets and Nutrition in the Developing World: Results from ARENA II

Markets play a key role in delivering food and nutrition, even for poor and remote rural households. But nutrient-rich foods, especially animal-sourced foods, are very expensive in poor countries, suggesting that markets for perishable but nutritious foods are not functioning well. Both scientific research and real-world programs have largely focused on farm-level interventions to diversify […]

Advancing Research on Nutrition and Agriculture (ARENA)
IFPRI Program/Country Event

 | 

July 28, 2018, 8:30 – 5:00 pm

Advancing Research on Nutrition and Agriculture (ARENA)

The agricultural sector has long been viewed as a major driver of poverty reduction and food security in developing countries, but is now increasingly asked to also reduce the global burden of undernutrition. The linkages between agriculture and nutrition are complex, however. Agricultural growth contributes to income and can directly supply households with a variety […]

Advancing Research (and Policy) on Nutrition and Agriculture
IFPRI Policy Seminar

 | 

February 22, 2018, 12:15 – 1:45 pm

Advancing Research (and Policy) on Nutrition and Agriculture

Speaker Panelists Closing Remarks Moderator Q&A Video Podcast Audio The agricultural sector has long been viewed as a major driver of poverty reduction and food security in developing countries, but is now increasingly asked to contribute to reducing the global burden of undernutrition. The linkages between agriculture and nutrition are complex, however, and not well […]

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Donors

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Team members

Derek Headey

Derek Headey

Senior Research Fellow, Development
Strategies and Governance

Derek Headey

Derek Headey

Senior Research Fellow, Development
Strategies and Governance

Will Martin

Will Martin

Senior Research Fellow, Markets,
Trade, and Institutions

Liangzhi You

Liangzhi You

Senior Research Fellow, Foresight
and Policy Modeling

Zhe Guo

Zhe Guo

Senior GIS Coordinator, Foresight
and Policy Modeling

Wahid Quabili

Wahid Quabili

Senior Research Analyst, Poverty,
Gender, and Inclusion

Other

Topics/Countries