LIRNEasia Lead Economist appointed to scientific advisory committee eARN Africa


Posted on June 22, 2009  /  4 Comments

LIRNEasia Lead Economist Harsha de Silva was recently appointed to a five-member Scientific Advisory committee for a two-year multi-country African research project, eAgriculture Network for Africa (eARN Africa): Effectiveness of Electronic-Based Interventions in Linking African Farmers to Markets. The project aims study the effectiveness of ICT-based intervention in linking African farmers to markets so as to inform policy decisions of African governments and stakeholders aimed at improving livelihood of smallholder farmers.

The project is funded by the International Development Research Center (IDRC) of Canada; an inception meeting was recently held in Kampala, Uganda, which Harsha de Silva attended. The project will be conducted in six African countries: Kenya, Malawi, Uganda, Ghana, Benin, and Madagascar.

The  Scientific Advisory Committee constitutes:

  • Prof. Chris Ackello-Ogutu, Department of Agricultural Economics, University of Nairobi, Kenya
  • Prof. Julian May, School of Development Studies, Kwa Zulu Natal, South Africa
  • Dr. Colin Poulton, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
  • Dr. Adrian Mukhebi, CEO Kenya Agricultural Commodity Exchange and Market Economist, Nairobi
  • Dr Harsha M. De Silva, Lead Economist, LIRNEasia

Harsha leads the agriculture-focused research at LIRNEasia, including a study on the impact of ICTs on transaction costs in agricultural markets in 2007.

4 Comments


  1. Chanuka Wattegama

    Congratulation Harsha. Great to hear this.

  2. Congratulations Dr. Harsha.

    Hope you can make use eARN Africa experiences in Asia as well.

    Sameera.
    http://ict4d-in-srilanka.blogspot.com/

  3. Congratulations Dr. Harsha

    -Sameera.

  4. thanks! the great thing is that with such interactions what ever we learnt in asia we can now share with our friends in africa. faster learning curve, less replication and clearly more efficient…