Subscribe

Back

Who we are

With research staff from more than 70 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

Lilia Bliznashka

Lily Bliznashka is a Research Fellow in the Nutrition, Diets, and Health Unit. Her research focuses on assessing the effectiveness of multi-input nutrition-sensitive and nutrition-specific interventions and the mechanisms through which they work to improve maternal and child health and nutrition globally. She has worked in Burkina Faso, Burundi, Tanzania, and Uganda.

Back

What we do

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

Research topics

Projects and impact

Food Security Portal

Modeling tools

What’s new

Where we work

Back

Where we work

IFPRI currently has more than 480 employees working in over 70 countries with a wide range of local, national, and international partners.

IFPRI Regional Programs

IFPRI Country and Regional Offices

Research by country and region

Subscribe

experts

Markets, Trade, and Institutions

Gashaw Abate

Research Fellow

Follow

Gashaw

at:

ORCiD
abate_gashaw

Bio

Gashaw T. Abate is a Research Fellow in the Markets, Trade, and Institutions Unit, based in Washington, DC. Gashaw’s research topics include agricultural value chains, technology adoption, agricultural extension and advisory services, producer organizations, economic inclusion, and survey methods and measurements. Most of his research involves impact evaluation methods, and he has extensive experience in designing and implementing large-scale household surveys and randomized controlled trials.

Gashaw has been involved in several projects, including Stiftungsallianz für Afrika (SAfA: Foundations Alliance for Africa); Digital Agricultural Advisory Services (DAAS); Research for Ethiopia’s Agriculture Policy (REAP); Coffee Agronomy Programs, which promotes regenerative practices; and the CGIAR Research Initiatives on Rethinking Food Markets, Market Intelligence, Seed Equal, and One Health. Gashaw holds a PhD in development studies from the University of Trento.

Google Scholar Citations

Research Gate Profile

RePEc Author Profile

Publications

Resource thumbnail

Journal Article

When the going gets tough: Experimental evidence of respondent fatigue in household surveys

2026Tabe-Ojong, Martin Paul Jr; Abay, Kibrom A.; Abate, Gashaw T.; Machio, Phyllis M.
Details

When the going gets tough: Experimental evidence of respondent fatigue in household surveys

Constructing per capita estimates (e.g., consumption), poverty rates, and other development indicators requires the listing of household members as well as their detailed demographic characteristics in household surveys using rosters. We designed an experiment to understand how respondents and enumerators manage such lengthy listing exercises in household surveys. We randomly assign respondents to ‘committed’ and ‘uncommitted’ household member listing rosters. If respondents are likely to reduce effort, they would decrease the number of household members reported in the uncommitted option, when they have the choice to list fewer members and save time. We find a 6–7% reduction in the number of household members listed when household rosters are enumerated with an uncommitted method, implying that 1 out of every 5 respondents reported an additional household member when asked using the committed household roster. Respondent/survey fatigue could explain the difference in the two measures of household size. Overall, our findings speak to the critical role of survey design in ensuring data quality and the important trade-off between survey length and data quality.

Year published

2026

Authors

Tabe-Ojong, Martin Paul Jr; Abay, Kibrom A.; Abate, Gashaw T.; Machio, Phyllis M.

Citation

Tabe-Ojong, Martin Paul Jr; Abay, Kibrom A.; Abate, Gashaw T.; and Machio, Phyllis M. 2026. When the going gets tough: Experimental evidence of respondent fatigue in household surveys. Journal of African Economies 35(2): ejag001. https://doi.org/10.1093/jae/ejag001

Country/Region

Kenya

Keywords

Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Eastern Africa; Capacity Building; Surveys; Household Surveys

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-NC-ND-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1093/jae/ejag001 Source record

Record type

Journal Article

Resource thumbnail

Brief

Outcome assessment of the digital agriculture ecosystem in Ethiopia

2026Yesigat, Habtamu; Abate, Gashaw T.; Spielman, David J.
Details

Outcome assessment of the digital agriculture ecosystem in Ethiopia

Ethiopia is making gradual but notable progress toward the digital transformation of its agricultural sector, driven by investments in connectivity, digital infrastructure, and cross-institutional coordination. Recent policy milestones have established an enabling foundation for scale, including the Digital Ethiopia 2025 and Digital Ethiopia 2030, personal data protection regulation and governance frameworks, and national roadmaps that will steer investment and implementation over the next decade—particularly the Digital Agriculture Extension and Advisory Services (DAEAS) roadmap and the Digital Agriculture Roadmap (DAR). However, persistent structural constraints such as limited rural internet coverage, low smartphone penetration, and unreliable electricity continue to shape the pace and equity of adoption. This paper synthesizes Ethiopia’s digital agriculture ecosystem with a focus on technology, data and analytical capacity, and policy environment. In the technology landscape, work is ongoing to develop decision-support applications alongside digital channels for delivering advisory services. Evidence from multiple pilot initiatives suggests these tools can expand outreach cost-effectively and improve the timeliness and relevance of agronomic guidance. The success of various pilot projects, along with valuable lessons from earlier efforts, strong government commitment, and supportive policies, has driven further investment in Ethiopia’s digital ecosystem. Nonetheless, substantial gaps remain in data availability and quality that limits the production of high-quality and context-specific advisory content. In addition, the reach and intensity of extension services needed to translate digital innovation into sustained productivity gains, income and livelihoods is not yet at the level desired. While Ethiopia’s digital agriculture agenda is well-positioned for accelerated scale, its impact will depend on resolving foundational constraints in last-mile connectivity, power reliability, and the institutions and pipelines required for trustworthy data and localized advisory at national scale.

Year published

2026

Authors

Yesigat, Habtamu; Abate, Gashaw T.; Spielman, David J.

Citation

Yesigat, Habtamu; Abate, Gashaw T.; and Spielman, David J. 2026. Outcome assessment of the digital agriculture ecosystem in Ethiopia. IFPRI Policy Note. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/180318

Country/Region

Ethiopia

Keywords

Africa; Sub-saharan Africa; Eastern Africa; Assessment; Digital Agriculture; Data

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Source

Source record

Record type

Brief

Resource thumbnail

Journal Article

Rural land rental markets in developing countries: Can survey design innovations improve land market participation statistics?

2026Abate, Gashaw T.; Abay, Kibrom A.; Chamberlin, Jordan; Sebsibie, Samuel
Details

Rural land rental markets in developing countries: Can survey design innovations improve land market participation statistics?

A longstanding puzzle in the African land rental market literature is the often-observed discrepancy between the number of tenants (renters-in) and the much smaller number of landlords (renters-out) in survey data. If this discrepancy derives from systematic biases in survey data responses on rental market participation, then the existing body of survey-based empirical work on land rental markets impacts may be fundamentally flawed. To examine this issue, we implemented two survey experiments. First, we tested the hypothesis that some categories of rented land are underreported because enumerators and respondents focus primarily on parcels directly managed or cultivated by the household. A random subset of respondents received a priming nudge reminding them to account for all land, including rented- or sharecropped-in and rented- or sharecropped-out parcels. Second, we tested whether households underreport rented- or sharecropped-out land due to reluctance to disclose activities that may carry social or institutional repercussions, using a double-list experiment to infer true rates of participation. Interestingly, our results indicate a significant underreporting of both renting-in and renting-out land but arising through different mechanisms. The priming nudge increased reports of renting-/sharecropping-in by 4 percentage points (equivalent to 13% of landlords in the sample) but had negligible effects on reported renting-/sharecropping-out. By contrast, the list experiment suggests that the true share of renting-out households is about 15%: much higher than the 3% in parcel-roster responses. These results underscore the need for improved survey methods to accurately observe land rental market participation and evaluate its impact.

Year published

2026

Authors

Abate, Gashaw T.; Abay, Kibrom A.; Chamberlin, Jordan; Sebsibie, Samuel

Citation

Abate, Gashaw T.; Abay, Kibrom A.; Chamberlin, Jordan; and Sebsibie, Samuel. Rural land rental markets in developing countries: Can survey design innovations improve land market participation statistics? American Journal of Agricultural Economics. Article in press. First published online October 18, 2025. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajae.70022

Keywords

Africa; Developing Countries; Landowners; Tenants; Statistics; Survey Design

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open AccessCC-BY-4.0

Links

https://doi.org/10.1111/ajae.70022 Source record

Record type

Journal Article

Events

Land and Property Research Conference
IFPRI at External Event

 | 

April 29 to May 1, 2026

Land and Property Research Conference

This year’s conference features academic research on land governance, land markets, and institutions, and their impact on economic growth and poverty reduction, structural transformation and resilience, private investment, and job creation.  The conference also includes sessions on property taxation and urban development, equity and rights, land-related conflict and land policy’s links to climate resilience. A […]

31st International Conference of Agricultural Economists (ICAE)
IFPRI at External Event

 | 

August 17 to 31, 2021

31st International Conference of Agricultural Economists (ICAE)

Virtual Event: AUG 17, 2021 – 08:00 AM to AUG 31, 2021 08:00 PM EDT. IFPRI is participating in the 31st Conference of Agriculture Economists organized by the International Association of Agricultural Economists (IAAE). 

2020 ReSAKSS Conference -- Sustaining Africa's Agrifood System Transformation: The Role of Public Policies
IFPRI Program/Country Event

 | 

November 3 to 5, 2020

2020 ReSAKSS Conference — Sustaining Africa’s Agrifood System Transformation: The Role of Public Policies

IFPRI is participating in the 2020 ReSAKSS Annual Conference, which will bring together state and nonstate actors to deliberate on the key findings and policy recommendations of the ReSAKSS 2020 Annual Trends and Outlook Report (ATOR). The report reviews how policy regimes have evolved in recent decades; examines the extent to which current policies for agrifood […]

View all Events

News

June 12, 2025 | Press Release

New special issue of Food Policy examines fertilizer and soil health policies in the wake of global crises

Key findings were presented and discussed during the IFPRI policy seminar on June 11.

July 31, 2020 | In the News

Hunger spectre casts long, ominous shadow. Time to get ready (Addis Fortune) 

Addis Fortune published an article writing, challenges from COVID-19 and the effect on poor and fixed-income households is often unfortunately lost in the attention given to the macroeconomy. The COVID-19 pandemic is contributing to food insecurity as incomes are affected. Gashaw T. Abate et al. conducted a survey of around 600 households and found that among the households surveyed between […]

October 09, 2018 | In the News

Great Expectations from Ethiopia’s Wheat Initiative (Thomson Reuters Foundation News)

Thomson Reuters Foundation News published an op-ed by several IFPRI researchers including Gashaw Tadesse Abate, Tanguy Bernard, Alan de Brauw, and Nicholas Minot, who examined the impact of Ethiopia’s Wheat Initiative on farmers’ yields to understand how programs can boost wheat yields in underperforming areas. 

View all News