Melinda Smale
msmale@msu.edu
Telephone: 703-231-8492
Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics
Faculty Member
446 W. Circle Dr., Rm 219Justin S Morrill Hall of Agriculture
East Lansing, MI 48824-1039
Area of Expertise:
Development Economics
Degree:
Ph.D., University of Maryland, College Park
M.S., University of Wisconsin-Madison
M.A., Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies
B.A., Duke University
Publications on Google Scholar
Melinda Smale joined the Food Security Group at Michigan State in 2011 as a fixed-term faculty member, after working for a number of years with researchers in developing countries through the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). From 2002, as a Senior Research Fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and Economist at Bioversity International, she led a global research program about the impacts of biotech crops, agricultural biodiversity, local seed markets, and underutilized crops. She conducted extensive research in Uganda and Mali. From 1989 to 2000, while living in Malawi and later in Mexico, she analyzed the adoption and impacts of improved wheat and maize seed for the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT). During the 1980s, Melinda worked in Pakistan, Somalia, Mauritania and Niger on shorter-term assignments for CIMMYT, Chemonics International, Volunteers in Technical Assistance (VITA), and USAID. She has served as an Honorary Fellow with Bioversity International, on the Advisory Committee of the Collaborative Crops Research Program of the McKnight Foundation, and on the editorial committees of several journals. She has worked on the following projects at MSU:
- Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy: Mali
- Guiding Investments in Sustainable Agricultural Intensification in Africa - GISAIA
- Kenya - Tegemeo Agricultural Policy Research and Analysis Project - TAPRA II
Professional Interests
- Adoption and impact processes for seed, including biotechnology, and improved crop management practices, including practices to rehabilitate soil fertility and moisture
- Analysis of farm productivity
- Crop biodiversity, on-farm and ex situ conservation of crop genetic resources
- Formal and informal seed systems
Student theses
- Syed Hamza Haider (PhD candidate)
- Aissatou Ouedraogo (PhD 2017)