In partnership with IPA Mali, the National Union of Agro-Input Dealers, and Soro Yiriwaso, researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to measure the impact of varying contract terms of input purchases and access to credit at Village Input Fairs (VIFs) on farmers’ decisions to buy and use agricultural inputs. VIFs organized in the post-harvest period and with credit access had significant positive effects on farmers' demand for input, input adoption, and household agricultural labor supply. Based on these findings, IPA is helping to scale the intervention to reach 60 thousand farmers over two years.

In collaboration with IPA Liberia, Agricorps, and 4-H Liberia, researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to measure the impact of a school-based agricultural extension program on the spread of agricultural technologies and rural education. The program improved agricultural technology adoption, students’ livelihoods, and students’ education, with greater impacts when combined with parental engagement.

Farmers across the developing world face risk from hazards such as weather, pests, and crop disease, but largely lack insurance to manage these risks. One reason for this lack of viable insurance products may be that farmers know their plots and risks better than insurers, and react accordingly. In the Philippines, researchers offered insurance on randomly assigned plots to farmers, and found that farmers preferred to insure the plots that faced more risk. Farmers also invested less in fertilizer for insured plots, and those plots suffered from more preventable (pests and crop disease) than natural (flood and typhoon) damage. The findings suggest that information that is unavailable (at least in part) to insurance providers—the susceptibility of agricultural plots to damage and farmers’ effort to prevent damages—may be a substantial barrier to the functioning of crop insurance markets.