Professional Experience:
From 2001 to 2004 I was a research fellow at the Institute of Rural Development at Georg-August-University Göttingen, Germany. Apart from being engaged in my Ph.D. research (see ‘Education’ below), I taught master-level courses on investment analysis and monitoring and evaluation of development projects. After completing my Ph.D. in 2004, I became a post-doctoral fellow and project leader of IMPENSO (see ‘Education’) until the project ended in December 2005. In addition, I taught master-level courses on microeconomic theory and investment analysis and co-supervised M.Sc. students.
From 2006 to 2012 I held a position as assistant professor at the Department of Agricultural Economics at the University of Hohenheim, Germany. I was a subproject leader in two phases of a large interdisciplinary project in Vietnam (‘The Uplands Program’), funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG). I was intensely involved in proposal preparation for this and other research projects. My research focused on farm households’ risk management and technology adoption, as well as poverty and vulnerability assessment. I further developed lecture materials for an international M.Sc. program and taught courses on quantitative research methods, applied econometrics, and rural development strategies and policies. My lectures were very favorably evaluated by the international master students. I also co-supervised international Ph.D. and M.Sc. students.
From January 2013 to January 2019 I held a position as Senior Agricultural Economist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT by its Spanish acronym). Based in New Delhi, India, I was the principal CIMMYT economist in the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA), funded by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and USAID (total budget 60 million USD). The overall goal of CSISA is the sustainable intensification of agriculture in the Indo-Gangetic Plain, the most important breadbasket of South Asia. I designed and implemented studies to assess the adoption and impact of productivity enhancing and labor- and fuel saving technologies, using novel methods of electronic data capture and up to 20 enumerators and research assistants. Primary topics were the use of zero-tillage in wheat, sustainable intensification pathways for fallow land, and enhancing smallholders’ income through sustainable commercial maize production. All research activities were aimed at deducing practical recommendations for enhancing impact at scale, including viable scaling mechanisms and enabling policies, and were carried out in close collaboration with other international and national research and extension partners. Further tasks comprised capacity building of project partners (electronic data capture, monitoring & evaluation, business development) and intense involvement in fund raising and strategy development, as well as regular donor interaction.
Since February 2019 I have worked for CIMMYT as a consultant, based in Germany.