Billions of rural people rely on small-scale farming for an income, but climate change and the degradation of natural resources threaten the ecosystems that they depend on. Despite being at the front lines of the climate crisis, smallholder farmers receive just 0.8 per cent of global climate finance. While women produce up to 80% of the food in low- and middle-income countries, deep-rooted gender-based discrimination means they have limited access to resources to build resilience to climate change. A comprehensive approach that delivers climate finance to women farmers while changing gender disparities is needed. The project will be developed in collaboration with the International Organization IFAD (International Fund for Agricultural Development), under the initiative Gender Transformative Mechanisms (GTM) in the context of Climate Adaptation, considering – as case study – the gender team of IFAD. The GTM is an IFAD facility supporting women and men benefitting from IFAD with investments to promote gender transformative programming while building their resilience capacities. The Ph.D. candidate will generate robust empirical evidence on the effects of gender equality-climate resilience derived from the implementation of GTM interventions in pilot projects in Burkina Faso, India and Ethiopia. The candidate will be involved in quantitative and qualitative research on GTM impacts on its intended beneficiaries.

The candidate should hold at least a Master’s degree in economics or related field (e.g. agricultural economics, development economics, natural resource economics, rural development economics), or a strong quantitative interdisciplinary program in which economics are included. Knowledge in natural resource economics, demonstrated capacity to integrate gender equality, rural women’s empowerment in the context of agriculture and economics concepts are considered extra merit. Excellent written and oral communication skills in English are required. Working knowledge of French is preferable but not mandatory.

The PhD student will work under the supervision of prof. Anna C. Rosso and Elena Maggi, from the Department of Economics of University of Insubria, that has been promoted by the University and Research Ministry as Department of Excellence 2023-2027. This department offers a Ph.D. in Methods and Models for Economic Decisions (MMED), where Anna C. Rosso and Elena Maggi are members of the board. The PhD student will have the chance to: first, collaborate with other PhD students; second to network with international scientists that the PhD board regularly invites to workshops and to give lectures. The candidate will work with the researchers of IFAD, with an internship of at least 6 months.