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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.

Ahmed Akhter

researcher spotlight

Akhter Ahmed

Akhter Ahmed is a Senior Research Fellow in the IFPRI’s Poverty, Gender, and Inclusion Unit and Country Representative for IFPRI Bangladesh. He has worked on strategies for agricultural and rural development, social protection, and women’s empowerment to reduce poverty, food insecurity, and undernutrition in developing countries including Bangladesh, China, Egypt, India, Malawi, the Philippines, and Turkey.

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Since 1975, IFPRI’s research has been informing policies and development programs to improve food security, nutrition, and livelihoods around the world.

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experts

Markets, Trade, and Institutions

Carly Trachtman

Associate Research Fellow

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Carly

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ORCiD

Bio

Carly Trachtman is an Associate Research Fellow in the Markets, Trade, and Institutions Unit at IFPRI. Carly’s research focuses on topics such as social protection program targeting, agricultural value chains, and technology adoption. She has methodological interests in issues related to welfare measurement and experimental design. Carly received her PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from UC Berkeley. She also holds an MS in Agricultural and Resource Economics from UC Berkeley and a BA in Economics and Mathematics from Lafayette College.

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Publications

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Working Paper

Production and consumption traits and the adoption of improved maize varieties: Evidence from seed sample packs and cooking demonstrations

2025Van Campenhout, Bjorn; Nabwire, Leocardia; Kramer, Berber; Trachtman, Carly; Abate, Gashaw T.
Details

Production and consumption traits and the adoption of improved maize varieties: Evidence from seed sample packs and cooking demonstrations

In developing countries, semi-subsistence farmers typically assume dual roles as both consumers and producers of the same crops, which shape their adoption decisions as they balance household food security with market-driven incentives. This study, conducted in eastern Uganda, employs a field experiment with two intervention arms to assess the relative importance of these factors in farmers’ decisions to adopt improved maize seed varieties. The first intervention focuses on production traits, distributing free sample packs of an improved hybrid maize variety to showcase benefits such as higher yields, pest resistance, and drought tolerance. The second intervention emphasizes consumption traits, offering cooking demonstrations and blind taste tests using flour from the same improved maize variety to highlight its taste, texture, and ease of preparation. Our findings reveal that while seed sample packs positively influenced farmers’ perceptions of both production and consumption traits, cooking demonstrations primarily affected perceptions of consumption qualities. We find some evidence that the cooking demonstrations and tasting sessions significantly boosted adoption of the improved maize seed variety promoted by the intervention. However, farmers who received seed sample packs tended to recycle the harvested grain as seed in subsequent seasons, thereby crowding out fresh seed purchases. This practice led to productivity losses, suggesting that the seed trial packs did not translate into lasting improvements in food security or increased market participation.

Year published

2025

Authors

Van Campenhout, Bjorn; Nabwire, Leocardia; Kramer, Berber; Trachtman, Carly; Abate, Gashaw T.

Citation

Van Campenhout, Bjorn; Nabwire, Leocardia; Kramer, Berber; Trachtman, Carly; and Abate, Gashaw T. 2025. Production and consumption traits and the adoption of improved maize varieties: Evidence from seed sample packs and cooking demonstrations. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2331. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/173943

Country/Region

Uganda

Keywords

Africa; Eastern Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Technology Adoption; Consumption; Cooking; Maize

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Source

Source record

Project

Seed Equal

Record type

Working Paper

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Brief

Integrating consumer traits is key to increasing uptake of improved crop varieties: Evidence and policy insights from seed sample packs and cooking events in Uganda

2024Van Campenhout, Bjorn; Nabwire, Leocardia; Kramer, Berber; Trachtman, Carly; Abate, Gashaw T.
Details

Integrating consumer traits is key to increasing uptake of improved crop varieties: Evidence and policy insights from seed sample packs and cooking events in Uganda

 Semi-subsistence farmers in developing countries often play dual roles as both consumers and producers of the same crops. Consequently, decisions regarding crop selection are influenced by a com bination of household consumption needs and market-oriented considerations.  In this policy note, we summarize findings from a field experiment suggesting that integrating con sumption-oriented traits such as taste, color, and ease of cooking alongside production advantages is crucial for driving demand for improved crop varieties.  The field experiment consists of two interventions designed to enhance the adoption of improved maize seed varieties among smallholder farmers in eastern Uganda. The first intervention involves providing farmers with free seed sample packs to plant and directly experience the production related benefits, such as higher yield potential and drought resistance. The second intervention consists of organizing cooking demonstrations and blind tasting sessions to compare maize from improved variety with local varieties, focusing on consumption traits like palatability, texture, and ease of cooking.  We find that the seed sample packs significantly enhance farmers’ perceptions of the seed’s production traits, while the cooking demonstrations improve appreciation for its consumption traits. We also find that the cooking demonstration and tasting session increased the use of fresh Bazooka seed, with some indications that this also led to higher maize productivity. On the other hand, farmers who received the sample packs are more likely to reuse/recycle the grain harvested from the sample pack as seed in the subsequent season, essentially crowding out the demand for fresh/purchased seed. We argue that this may be a rational response in the context of positive transaction costs related to the use of improved seed varieties

Year published

2024

Authors

Van Campenhout, Bjorn; Nabwire, Leocardia; Kramer, Berber; Trachtman, Carly; Abate, Gashaw T.

Citation

Campenhout, Bjorn Van; Nabwire, Leocardia; Kramer, Berber; Trachtman, Carly; and Abate, Gashaw T. 2024. Integrating consumer traits is key to increasing uptake of improved crop varieties: Evidence and policy insights from seed sample packs and cooking events in Uganda. IFPRI Policy Brief December 2024. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/168659

Country/Region

Uganda

Keywords

Africa; Eastern Africa; Consumer Behaviour; Crops; Varieties; Seeds; Farmers; Cooking; Maize

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Source

Source record

Project

Market Intelligence

Record type

Brief

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Working Paper

Market information and R&D investment under ambiguity: A framed artefactual experiment with plant breeding professionals

2024Trachtman, Carly; Kramer, Berber; do Nascimento Miguel, Jérémy
Details

Market information and R&D investment under ambiguity: A framed artefactual experiment with plant breeding professionals

Investments in R&D are often made under ambiguity about the potential impacts of various projects. High-quality, systematic market research could help reduce that ambiguity, including in investments in agricultural research-for-development, such as plant breeding. Using an online framed artefactual experiment with a diverse sample of breeding experts working in various disciplines across the world, we ask how market information and information quality influences breeding experts’ investments in prospects with ambiguous returns, and how the quality and source of information affect willingness to pay for market information. We find that providing market information leads participants to make more prioritized (rather than diversified) decisions. However, participants do not consider differences in information quality, instead over extrapolating from noisy and biased information signals. Finally, while most participants are willing to use experimental funds to purchase market information, around half prefer lower quality information even if higher quality information is available at the same price. We conclude that prioritizing R&D projects with greater impact opportunities will require better awareness among decision-makers of quality issues in various types of market research.

Year published

2024

Authors

Trachtman, Carly; Kramer, Berber; do Nascimento Miguel, Jérémy

Citation

Trachtman, Carly; Kramer, Berber; and do Nascimento Miguel, Jérémy. 2024. Market information and R&D investment under ambiguity: A framed artefactual experiment with plant breeding professionals. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2314. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/169025

Keywords

Agricultural Research for Development; Plant Breeding; Experimental Design; Market Research

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Source

Source record

Project

Market Intelligence

Record type

Working Paper

Blogs

Workshop: Assessing on-the-ground impacts of genetic innovation in agriculture
IFPRI Blog
 | 
January 15, 2025

Workshop: Assessing on-the-ground impacts of genetic innovation in agriculture

By Emily Kilonzi, Berber Kramer, and Carly Trachtman

A coordinated multi-country approach.

How we used coordinated trials and meta-analysis to evaluate interventions to increase varietal turnover
IFPRI Blog
 | 
December 19, 2024

How we used coordinated trials and meta-analysis to evaluate interventions to increase varietal turnover

By Berber Kramer, Carly Trachtman, and Witold Więcek

Assessing impacts of a multi-country project.

Events

2023 Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA) Annual Meeting
IFPRI at External Event

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July 23 to 25, 2023

2023 Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA) Annual Meeting

Event: July 23, 2023 – 8:30 AM to July 25, 2023 – 4:15 PM EDT. IFPRI is participating in the 2023 Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA) Annual Meeting.