An assessment of IFPRI’S work in Ethiopia 1995–2010

Ideology, influence, and idiosyncrasy

This study provides an independent external assessment of the impact of IFPRI’s work in Ethiopia during 1995–2010. From 1995 to 2004, nearly all of IFPRI’s Ethiopia work was undertaken by Washington-based research teams working on specific themes under various “global research programs”. In each case, Ethiopia represented one of several case studies in a larger multicountry study. The international public goods generated in this way included peer-reviewed publications; collaborative research with both domestic and international researchers; and the building of national capacity for policy research. IFPRI entered into a different kind of relationship with Ethiopia in 2004 with the establishment of the Ethiopia Strategy Support Program (ESSP). The ESSP was set up to provide direct support to the Government of Ethiopia in the design and implementation of its national agricultural development strategy and to provide well-researched advice on other agricultural and rural development policy matters.

The reviewers find that (i) IFPRI’s activities in Ethiopia have generated a steady stream of high-quality research output across a number of thematic areas; (ii) IFPRI’s contributions to capacity building, although less than anticipated, are likely to produce a flow of additional benefits over the long run; (iii) an increase in openness and transparency in framing policy (in the Government of Ethiopia) is a valuable, if unquantifiable, benefit; (iv) there is widespread acknowledgment within the donor community in Ethiopia that IFPRI’s research has contributed substantially both to the establishment of donor priorities and to donor efforts to support GoE policies consistent with those priorities; (v) IFPRI has contributed strongly to institutional change; and (vi) the primary welfare benefits attributable to IFPRI that the study was able to capture are those accruing to participants in the Productive Safety Net Program in the form of increases in reported household food security and asset holdings.