Dr. Mousumi Bhattacharjee

Mousumi is an applied economist working on interdisciplinary and sustainable public policy related issues. She is as an ad-hoc faculty at the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar School of Economics (BASE) University, Bengaluru. She is also a consultant at the International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington DC.

She has previously worked with the NCAER India, Xavier Institute of Management University Bhubaneshwar, LEAD and GSB KREA University Chennai, World Bank India, United Nations South-South Office, TISS Hyderabad and IFPRI, Washington DC. Her research papers and significant projects focusses on the regions of Asia-Pacific and Africa.

Mousumi has won several global fellowships and awards. She has been referred to and published in high-impact national and international journals.

Research Interests

• Applied econometrics and data science
• Multidimensional measures
• Applications in the fields of food & nutrition policy
• Climate smart agriculture
• Skills & education
• Risk & vulnerability
• Crime
• Gender
• Public health
• Covid-19
• Machine learning
• Data gaps
• Survey methodology & design
• Mixed methods
• Social entrepreneurship

Publications

Peer-Review Journals/Select Works-in-Progress 

Food & Nutrition Policy 

• Forthcoming S.C. Babu & MB (2024). Nutrition economics and climate change, in the Handbook of Labor,  Human Resources and Population Economics edited by Prof Klaus Zimmermann, President Global Labor  Organization Economics of Nutrition | SpringerLink
• B, M., R. Kuppacchi, S.C. Babu (2022). Decentralized Decision Support System for Climate Smart Agriculture: Economics of a Dashboard Approach, mimeo, submitted to T20 Ideas DropBox
• Kuppachi, R., S.C. Babu, MB (Forthcoming, 2022). Effects of climate smart agriculture interventions on greenhouse gas emissions: Evidence from rice producing districts of India, Mimeo, IFPRI, Washington D.C. • Food & nutrition security related issues in Nepal with Prajula Mulmi and S.C. Babu (work-in-progress) • Technical support, Biosecurity of pig-farms in Switzerland, led by D. Kuhlgutz and C. Kuhlgutz, Federal Office for  Agriculture (FOAG), Bern Switzerland
• Forthcoming 2024, Chapter 17, SDG 6: Approaches to assessing the impact of poor sanitation on child nutrition,  with Prof. Suresh Babu, Handbook on Public Policy and Food Security edited by Prof Sheryl Hendriks, University  of Greenwich & Prof Suresh Babu, Edward Elgar Publishing
• B, M. & Babu, S. C. (2018). Pathways from Agriculture to Nutrition: Evidence from Indian Districts, A disaggregated  dashboard analysis
• B, M. & Babu, S. C. (2018). Multidimensional poverty and food security: Evidence from Bangladesh using recent data (700 reads in Research Gate)
• Healthy Eating Index: Evidence from India, published by JRC110327 Affiliation: European Commission Project:  International Conference on “Quantitative Methods for Integrated Food and Nutrition Security Measurements.  Lessons to be learned!”, Brussels 15-17 Nov. 2017 by Tharcisse Nkunzimana, Joysee M. Rodríguez Baide and others  (592 reads in Research Gate)
• Pathways from Agriculture to Nutrition in India: Implications for Sustainable Development Goals. with S.C. Babu.  Food Security (2018), vol. 10(6), 1561-1576. (Springer) (Impact factor: 2.970) (18 citations) (118 reads in Research  Gate)
• D. Debnath, S. Babu, P. Westhoff and MB (2017). Nutrition transition under increasing urbanization in India: Policy  implications for achieving Sustainable Development Goals (selected for presentation at the Agricultural & Applied Economics Annual Meeting, Chicago Illinois 2017, also awarded AAEA Travel Grants for Early Career  Professionals)
• B, M. (2017). Prioritising Agriculture to Nutrition Pathways, July 2017 Issue of Yojana, published by the Ministry  of Information & Broadcasting, New Delhi (63 reads in Research Gate)
• B, M. & S.C. Babu (2017). Pathways from Agriculture to Nutrition in India: Implications for Sustainable  Development Goals, IFPRI Discussion Paper No. 1649, International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington  D.C.
• Chandrasekhar, S., & MB (2015). Short-term migration and consumption expenditure of households in rural  India. Oxford Development Studies, vol. 43(1), 105-122 (31 citations)
• B, M. (2014). Measures, Spatial Profile and Determinants of Dietary Diversity: Evidence from India, previously Dietary Diversity and Child Nutrition in Rural India: A Quantile Regression Analysis, IGIDR WP-2014-045 (13 citations)

Poverty, Inequality, Risk & COVID-19 

• NCAER NDIC Facebook Covid Trends & Impact Survey (CTIS), Masking & related issues (work-in-progress), with  Dr S Pramanik (Deputy Director, NCAER-NDIC)
• Pramanik, S. & MB (2021). Are you a low spreader and got vaccinated? Empirical evidence using the Facebook CTIS India data
• Skills, Inequality, and Pandemic Index (SIPI): Evidence from African nations using the World Income Inequality Database (work-in-progress, presented at IARIW TNBS Conference Tanzania 2022)
• Indian Safety Net Challenges during Covid-19, Learnings for the Global South (work-in-progress)
• B, M. & S. Pramanik (2021). Masking & Infections: Recent Evidence using Facebook CTIS India data
• B, M. (2021). Vulnerability to Food Insecurity: A Decomposition Exercise for Rural India using the Expected Utility  Approach. Social Indicators Research, vol. 156, pp. 167-199 (Impact factor: 1.703, A category)
• Mirindi, P. L., MB, Mirindi, P. N., and Babu, S. C. (2021). Constructing a nutrition deficiency index: Applications for the Democratic Republic of the Congo under a decade of humanitarian crises. IFPRI Discussion Paper 1999. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) (under review Special Issue Review of Income  & Wealth, TNBS, Revise and Resubmit Food and Nutrition Bulletin)
• Sylvanus, I & MB (2019). Multidimensional Poverty Index: Recent Evidence from Namibia, Background paper, Poverty Reduction in Namibia, World Bank (Report published, Paper – Work-in-progress, presented at IARIWTNBS Conference Tanzania 2022)
• Brzeska, J., MB, & Fan, S. (2015): Social protection for poor, vulnerable and disadvantaged groups, China  Agricultural Economic Review, vol. 7(4), pp. 668-687 (8 citations)
• B, M. (2015). Convergence in dietary diversity: Evidence from India & China
• Suryanarayana, M. H. & B, M. (2015): The Poorest Might Catch Up: Rawlsian Convergence vs. Pseudo Convergence, Journal of Global Studies in Economics, vol 1(1), pp. 7-19, 2393-9974
• Suryanarayana, M. H. & B, M. (2014): How Inclusive is India’s Reform(ed) Growth? Special Article, Economic  and Political Weekly, vol. 49 (6), pp. 44-52 (24 citations)

Education & Skills

• Major project, On no retention in India, with Prof Tomoki Fujii and Vardaan Chawla (Singapore Management University), Built large datasets, causal analysis, policy review
• Testing hybrid solutions to learning loss recovery: Evidence from select Indian cities (proposal submitted to TESF,  UK & ADB Learning Loss Call for Grants 2022, with Prof Amita Majumder, NCAER, CPIE)
• Student perception survey on the future of jobs, with Prof Fr. Joshy, School of Computer Science, XIM University Bhubaneswar
• Schooling strategies during the pandemic (ongoing discussion), with Prof Fr. Augustine, Rector, Loyal School  Bhubaneswar (previously Registrar XIM University Bhubaneswar)
• India’s triple burden of health skilling, Skills anticipation, matching and a preliminary STED analysis, with a focus on West Bengal (ILO Skills Anticipation & Training 2021) (work-in-progress)
• Skilling Strategy Paper series (NCAER – CBSE 2021), Vocational skilling & related issues (work-in-progress)
• Hybrid schooling strategies, Let skilling sustain, NCAER 2021, Pandemic Strategy Paper series
• Skilling India from the Ground up: Project Case Studies, NCAER, June 2021, with B. Bhandari, S. Bandyopadhyay, T. Bhattacharya, P. Choudhuri, J. Prabhakar, P. Rawat, A. Sahu
• Imparting and Assessing Skills, Background Chapter for the New Skills at Work Initiative (NSAWI) funded by J.P.  Morgan, and housed at NCAER, Skilling India: No Time to Lose, published by the National Council of Applied  Economic Research, New Delhi

Gender

• Gender Development Practice workshop, Oct 2022, Tata Institute of Social Sciences Hyderabad
• Making markets work for women, Female entrepreneurs (work-in-progress), mimeo, LEAD at KREA University
• B, M. & S. Babu (2021). Do land size, crop, and home garden diversity improve female children’s nutritional status? Pilot evidence from villages of West Bengal (Work-in-progress)
• B, M. & S. Babu (2019). Asian Enigma on Child Under-nutrition: An Indian Version and its Verification vide Structural Equation Modeling Approach (Work-in-progress)