Advisory Board

Prof Gautam N.Yadama

Prof Gautam N. Yadama is a Senior Advisor with Poverty Learning Foundation. He is Professor and Dean of Boston College School of Social Work. He is also a member of the Implementation Science Network on Clean Cooking at the Fogarty Institute of the National Institutes of Health, USA. His research expertise is in the domains of Poverty, Environmental Justice dynamics and their inter-relations. In his extensive research experience, he has successfully implemented a randomized control trial to study sustainability of new and efficient energy technologies in rural areas in India to reduce household air pollution and improve health of women. He is also using the tool of social network analysis and Community Based System Dynamics to study adoption of interventions by poor families in rural India to reduce pollution. He has successfully authored the book Fires, Fuel & the Fate of 3 Billion: State of the Energy Impoverished (Oxford University Press), which outlines an argument for transdisciplinary research to tackle complex problems such as household air pollution that reside at the intersections of poverty, environment, and health. Prof Gautam holds a Ph.D in Social Policy and Planning from Case Western Reserve University.

Prof Galab

Professor Galab is a senior advisor with Poverty Learning Foundation. He was previously the Principal Investigator for Young Lives in India and Director of the Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS), Hyderabad. He has previously been Project Director for Andhra Pradesh District Poverty Initiatives Project (APDPIP) and Andhra Pradesh Rural Poverty Reduction Project (APRPRP). He was a member of the Welfare Commission on Farmers a Commission appointed by the Government of Andhra Pradesh in response to the agrarian crisis. He has also been a member of the Working Group on Poverty Elimination. His research interests include poverty, natural resource management, the handloom sector solid waste management in urban areas and agrarian distress. He is a development economist witha doctorate in Economics and postgraduate degree in Economics and Statistics. He has carried out research on the effectiveness of public policies related to poverty alleviation,including social capital, women's empowerment, child work and livelihoods. He has alsoconducted research on the welfare impact of public sector reforms and has continually mentored many MPhil and PhD students at CESS.

Dr. Anne Chappuis

Dr. Anne Chappuis is a Senior Advisor with PLF. She has specialized in visual analytics applied to development and has worked extensively with various institutions, national and international, for local administration and decision makers. Her assignments on development issues helped diagnose problems through maps, graphs and visual re-ordable matrix, identify similarities and proximities, or oppositions, go from diagnosis to identification of risks and opportunities to develop future strategies and development plans. She has also proposed visual monitoring of projects. For more than 25 years she has directed the French company

Decision Graphics, and was pioneer in developing forecast methods for the French Railways using visual analytics. She has been an Associate Professor for 20 years in the Department of Geography, University of Rouen-Normandie, France. She was instrumental in the computerisation of the Graphics Semiology methods developed by Prof. Jacques Bertin and developed Geographic Management Information Systems (GMIS), an integration of GIS with MIS for Decision support. She holds a Ph.D. in Geography from the University of Rouen-Normandie, France.

Dr. Suhas P. Wani

Dr. Suhas P. Wani is a Senior advisor with PLF. He is the former Research Program Director Asia and Director, ICRISAT Development Center (IDC) at International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Patancheru, India. Currently he serves as Consultant, International Rice Research Institute, South Asia Regional Center, Varanasi, India, Advisor to JSW Foundation, Mumbai and also as Consultant Asian Development Bank, (ADB) Manila. His area of specialization is scaling-up science-based interventions to benefit millions of farmers in Asia and Africa particularly in the area of sustainable agriculture for improving rural livelihoods through integrated water resource management, Conservation agriculture. Through, various scaling-up projects in the states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh more than 10 million farmers have benefitted using improved soil, water, nutrient and crop management practices building soil health and increased carbon sequestration. Assessment of benefits with improved management options He has spearheaded number of Strategic papers for the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) covering varying areas from integrated water management through Pradhan Mantri sinchai Yojana (PMKSY), Soil health mapping, Pulses self-sufficiency, Direct benefit transfer, Weather-based crop insurance and Digital Agriculture. He crafted the pilot program for Doubling Farmers income in selected districts of Vidarbha in Maharashtra and Bundelkhand Region of Uttar Pradesh. Livelihoods improvement for small farm holders is the main thrust of his research for development (R4D). He has put together a strategy for doubling Farmers income by 2022 as envisioned by Govt. of India and pilot in 18 districts of Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh is being implemented. He has 600+ research papers published in national and international journals, books and conference proceedings.

Rahul Sen

Rahul Sen is a Senior Fellow and advisor with PLF. His current area of research includes designing and implementing quantified participatory assessment studies that are used for planning, monitoring and evaluation and decision support systems. His previous assignments include working on bilateral projects such as participatory integrated water resources management projects in Bundelkhand, Uttar Pradesh supported by Royal Netherlands Government, Watershed Development programs supported by GtZ/GIZ and KfW, Germany in states of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Orissa and Madhya Pradesh supported by Royal Danish Government and Indo-German Watershed and natural resources management programs in various capacities. He has worked as a senior consultant for the Planning Department, GoAP in its Vision Management Unit. He is well experienced in project management tools such as Logical Framework, Results Framework, Results Chain, Critical Pathway Analysis, PERT, GANTT and Force Field Analysis and MS Project. He holds a M.Phil in Social Anthropology from Delhi University. He has over 25 years of specialization in Institutional Development, Monitoring and Evaluation and Training and Capacity Building, primarily in the Natural Resource Management Sector.

Shri Ramprasad Ravi

Shri Ramprasad Ravi is an advisor with Poverty Learning Foundation. He has been a media veteran for more than three decades now - associated with leading print and electronic media houses throughout erstwhile Andhra Pradesh. He oversaw the launch of India's first ever shipping and logistics magazine, Maritime Gateway, the largest circulating magazine in the genre in South Asia.

He is a regular feature at industry forums and seminars, both in India and abroad. Widely recognised for his anchored efforts at making shipping and logistics industry issues more accessible for the public and policymakers alike, Ramprasad is associated with numerous GoI programmes and initiatives in an advisory role. He is an avid reader and globetrotter, having visited many ports and harbours across the world and writes regular columns and articles for a range of publications.