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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.

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Kinya Kaibung’a

Kinya Kaibung’a is a Research Officer with the Development Strategies and Governance Unit, based in Nairobi, Kenya. She has a keen interest in leveraging machine learning, AI, and other cutting-edge technologies to boost climate resilience and food security in smart agriculture systems.

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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

Poverty, Gender, and Inclusion

Mehrab Bakhtiar

Research Fellow

Bio

Mehrab Bakhtiar is a Research Fellow in the Poverty, Gender, and Inclusion Unit. A Bangladeshi development economist, he uses experimental and non-experimental methods to study the impact of interventions related to social protection, nutrition, and agriculture with a special focus on women’s empowerment and intrahousehold decision-making. He has carried out research in Bangladesh, Nigeria, and Ethiopia. As Deputy Chief of Party of the Feed the Future Bangladesh Agricultural Policy Activity, he has helped lead IFPRI’s policy engagements, research outreach, and implementation of national and sub-national surveys in Bangladesh since 2019.

Prior to his work with IFPRI, Bakhtiar worked as a Research Analyst at the Africa Gender Innovation Lab at the World Bank and was selected in the World Bank’s Young Professionals Program in 2019. Before heading to graduate school, he was a Research Coordinator at Innovations for Poverty Action, Bangladesh. He received his PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from University of Maryland–College Park, where his doctoral research was recognized by the Dr. and Mrs. Bill V. Lessley Dissertation Excellence Award.

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Publications

Resource thumbnail

Book Chapter

Mechanizing agriculture in Bangladesh: Trends, challenges, and policy priorities

2026Karim, Md. Aminul; Shamma, Raisa; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Belton, Ben; Kishore, Avinash; Ahmed, Akhter
Details

Mechanizing agriculture in Bangladesh: Trends, challenges, and policy priorities

Agricultural mechanization has become a cornerstone of rural transformation in Bangladesh (Zhang et al. 2014). Since the 1980s, the country has made significant strides in mechanizing various stages of agricultural production, from land preparation to harvesting (Mottaleb, Krupnik, and Erenstein 2016; Rahman et al. 2021). As in India and other neighboring countries, both informal custom-hiring businesses and government support have enabled the widespread use of agricultural machinery in Bangladesh (Biggs and Justice 2015). Mechanization has helped address growing labor shortages, increase labor productivity and input-use efficiency, and raise farmers’ incomes (Islam 2021; Mandal 2017).

Year published

2026

Authors

Karim, Md. Aminul; Shamma, Raisa; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Belton, Ben; Kishore, Avinash; Ahmed, Akhter

Citation

Karim, Md. Aminul; Shamma, Raisa; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Belton, Ben; Kishore, Avinash; and Ahmed, Akhter. 2026. Mechanizing agriculture in Bangladesh: Trends, challenges, and policy priorities. In Transforming Smallholder Agriculture Through Mechanization in Asia: Volume 1: Pathways and Policies, eds. Ma, Wanglin; Rahut, Dil B.; and Sonobe, Tetsushi. Chapter 1, p. 1-42. https://doi.org/10.56506/OFAY7376

Country/Region

Bangladesh

Keywords

Asia; Southern Asia; Agricultural Mechanization; Ownership; Econometric Models; Labour; Gender; Profitability

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Links

https://doi.org/10.56506/ofay7376 Source record

Record type

Book Chapter

Resource thumbnail

Working Paper

Risk aversion and credit access: Solving financial exclusion through contract innovation

2026Ambler, Kate; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; de Brauw, Alan; Uddin, Mohammad Riad
Details

Risk aversion and credit access: Solving financial exclusion through contract innovation

Credit market failures may reflect voluntary withdrawal by risk-averse borrowers in addition to supply-side constraints. We conduct a randomized trial with 1,517 Bangladeshi households, offering cattle financing through conventional loans or profit-sharing contracts that spread risk between the farmer and the financial partner. Overall, interest in and take-up of the profit-sharing contracts were modestly higher than the conventional loans. However, conventional loan take-up was much lower among risk-averse farmers, and profit-sharing eliminated the take-up gap between risk-averse and non-risk-averse farmers. We find that it is male risk preferences that are associated with these decisions even when contracts explicitly target women. Livestock investment increases under both contracts with no evidence of moral hazard under profit-sharing.

Year published

2026

Authors

Ambler, Kate; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; de Brauw, Alan; Uddin, Mohammad Riad

Citation

Ambler, Kate; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; de Brauw, Alan; and Uddian, Mohammad Riad. 2026. Risk aversion and credit access: Solving financial exclusion through contract innovation. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2405. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/181679

Country/Region

Bangladesh

Keywords

Southern Asia; Asia; Gender; Credit; Financing; Livestock; Loans; Smallholders; Financial Innovation; Access to Finance; Risk; Risk Coping Strategies

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Source

Source record

Project

Rethinking Food Markets

Record type

Working Paper

Resource thumbnail

Working Paper

Effects of brick kiln industry on agricultural productivity: A natural experiment in Bangladesh

2025Mahzab, Moogdho; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Mattsson, Martin; Anowar, Md Sadat
Details

Effects of brick kiln industry on agricultural productivity: A natural experiment in Bangladesh

Agriculture remains central to Bangladesh’s economy and food security, yet it is increasingly threatened by the rapid expansion of informal brick manufacturing that extracts fertile topsoil from cropland and generates heavy local pollution. This paper provides national-scale causal evidence on how brick kiln expansion affects vegetation health and agricultural productivity by combining long-run satellite observations with geolocated kiln data. We construct a spatiotemporal panel of unions and municipalities using annual the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer normalized difference vegetation index (MODIS NDVI) from 2002–2024 and a high-resolution inventory of 9,187 brick kilns detected through satellite imagery and machine learning. Using a continuous and staggered difference-in-differences design, we find no evidence of differential pre-trends, but we do find a clear and persistent deterioration in vegetation health following kiln establishment. The magnitude is economically meaningful: a marginal increase in kiln presence is associated with roughly a 1 percent annual decline in local vegetation productivity, with effects that persist and accumulate over time. These results are consistent with long-run soil degradation and chronic environmental exposure around kiln sites, and they imply substantial hidden costs of informal industrial growth in densely cultivated landscapes. The findings highlight the urgency of stronger enforcement of siting rules, of incentives for cleaner production technologies, and of land-use planning that protects high-productivity agricultural zones.

Year published

2025

Authors

Mahzab, Moogdho; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Mattsson, Martin; Anowar, Md Sadat

Citation

Mahzab, Moogdho; Bakhtiar, M. Mehrab; Mattsson, Martin; and Anowar, Md Sadat. 2025. Effects of brick kiln industry on agricultural productivity: A natural experiment in Bangladesh. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2402. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/180697

Country/Region

Bangladesh

Keywords

Asia; Southern Asia; Agricultural Productivity; Food Security; Plant Health; Remote Sensing; Drying Kilns

Language

English

Access/Licence

Open Access

Source

Source record

Record type

Working Paper

Events

2026 Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA) Annual Meeting
IFPRI at External Event

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July 26 to 28, 2026

2026 Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA) Annual Meeting

IFPRI is participating in the 2026 Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA) Annual Meeting on July 26– July 28, 2026. Taking place in Kansas City, Missouri at the Kansas City Marriott Downtown, the 2026 AAEA Annual Meeting is made up of Invited Paper Sessions, Invited Case Study Papers, Organized Symposia, Selected Presentations (Lightning Sessions, Paper […]

Delivering for Nutrition in South Asia: Towards Impact at Scale
IFPRI Program/Country Event

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December 2 to 4, 2025

Delivering for Nutrition in South Asia: Towards Impact at Scale

South Asia continues to face an enduring burden of malnutrition in all its forms—undernutrition, micronutrient deficiencies, and a steady increase in overweight and obesity and non-communicable diseases. Over 1 billion people in South Asia cannot afford a healthy diet. While many promising solutions have emerged, translating them into sustained, large-scale impact remains a challenge. This […]

Into, Through and Beyond USAID Programs: Lessons from the Women's Empowerment in Agriculture Index
IFPRI at External Event

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March 29, 2023, 9:00 – 10:15 am

Into, Through and Beyond USAID Programs: Lessons from the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index

Virtual Event: March 29, 2023 – 9:00 AM- 10:15 AM EDT. This webinar will mark the launch of two briefs, one on the use cases of WEAI in USAID projects worldwide and the other on how WEAI has informed and supported the design of policies and programs in Bangladesh.

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News

December 08, 2025 | In the News

Sellers not relying on middlemen anymore for fish sales: Study (The Daily Star)

IFPRI research presented at the BIDS Annual Conference on Development 2025, highlighting new evidence on aquaculture value chains, agricultural mechanization, and social protection.