Ranjan Kumar Ghosh

Biography

Ranjan Kumar Ghosh is a faculty member and chairperson at the Center for Management in Agriculture, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad. His research revolves around institutional economics, sustainable agri-food systems and natural resources policy. His MBA teaching is on value chain management, rural systems and agribusiness entrepreneurship. He is a regular consultant and advisor to several national and international agencies such as the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (UN-SDSN), The Nature Conservancy (TNS), Food Systems Economics Commission, WHO, Environmental Defense Fund, European Union, CGIAR Global, Ministry of Agriculture, FSSAI and Government of Gujarat. He also sits on the board of a large public sector enterprise, GNFC and Wheels Global Foundation (WGF) Water Council.

Prior to joining IIMA , Ranjan Ghosh worked and taught at Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) Uppsala. He holds a PhD in Resource Economics from Humboldt University Berlin and is an affiliated researcher with the Elinor Ostrom Workshop, Indiana University Bloomington, WINS Berlin and a fellow of the Ronald Coase Institute, Washington DC.

He is the country head for the UN-SDSN led FABLE Consortium, which is a part of the global food and land-use (FOLU) coalition working towards scientific and policy goals for sustainable food systems and land use transformations to achieve the SDGs. His work has helped directly shape policies on crop insurance, pandemic management, land governance, water security, unfair food practices and food labelling in India and the EU. His columns and interviews appear regularly in all the major media outlets of India.

Area

Primary Area : Centre for Management in Agriculture

Secondary Area : Economics

Contact

Email : ranjang@iima.ac.in

Phone : +91-79-7152 4913

Secretary : Viddhi Kotak

Phone : +91-79-7152 7901

Website : Personal Website

Education

Ph. D., Economics, Humboldt University Berlin, Germany (2014)

Visiting Scholar, Ostrom Workshop, Indiana University Bloomington, US , (2013)

M.Sc, Economics, Madras School of Economics (MSE), Chennai, India (2007)

B.A, Economics, Ramjas College, University of Delhi, India (2004)

Teaching

Master’s Course:

Value Chain Management - Applications in Agribusiness (VCM), IIM Ahmedabad
Agribusiness Entrepreneurship (ABE), IIM Ahmedabad
Rural Social and Institutional Environment (RuSIE), IIM Ahmedabad
Managing Sustainability, IIM Ahmedabad
Econometrics and Programming (Bachelor's), SLU Uppsala, Sweden
Economics of Agri-food Value Chains, SLU Uppsala, Sweden
Climate and Energy Management, Humboldt University Berlin, Germany
Institutional Economics and Political Economy, Humboldt University Berlin, Germany

Doctoral Courses

Foundations of New Institutional Economics (FNIE), IIM Ahmedabad
Agricultural Management (AM-2), IIM Ahmedabad
Agro-food Value Chain Management and Development, IIM Ahmedabad
Empirical Industrial Organization in Agri-Food Sector, SLU Uppsala, Sweden

Academic Experience

Assistant Professor, Indian Institute of Management (IIM) – Ahmedabad, (present)

Visiting Researcher, School of Forestry and Natural Resources, Purdue University [2019]

Forskare (eq. Assistant Professor), Department of Economics, SLU Uppsala, Sweden , (2016-17)

Post-Doctoral Fellow, Department of Economics, SLU Uppsala, Sweden, (2014-16)

Research Associate, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), New Delhi, (2008-09)

Professional Experience

Associate Fellow, WINS, Humboldt University Berlin

Alumni, The Ronald Coase Institute (RCI)

Member, The World Interdisciplinary Network for Institutional Research (WINIR)

Member, International Society for New Institutional Economics (ISNIE)

Ex-Economist, Citigroup Global Services, Mumbai Consultant, Global Soil Governance, IASS Potsdam, Germany

Consultant, Global Soil Governance, IASS, Potsdam, Germany

Articles

A decentralized approach to model national and global food and land use systems. Environmental Research Letters, 18(4), p.045001. 2023

Participation dynamics in multiple-disaster agricultural insurance: Insights from India. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, Vol. 70 (15), p.102781 2022

The role of food and land use systems in achieving India's sustainability targets. Environmental Research Letters, 17(7), p.074022. 2022

Pathway to achieve a sustainable food and land-use transition in India. Sustainability Science, pp. 1-12 2022

How can diverse national food and land-use priorities be reconciled with global sustainability targets? Lessons from the FABLE initiative. Sustainability Science, pp.1-11 2022

Editorial: Food Security, Agricultural Productivity, and the Environment: Economic, Sustainability, and Policy Perspectives. Frontiers in Environmental Science, 10:916272 2022

Informal land leasing in rural India persists because it is credible. Land Use Policy, 120, p.106299. 2022

Land tenure informalities and the pandemic. Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. LVII (20). 2022

Demand for crop insurance in developing countries: New evidence from India. Journal of Agricultural Economics, 72(1), pp.293-320. 2021

Is there a need for greater integration and shift in policy to tackle food waste? Insights from a review of European Union legislations. SN Applied Sciences, 2(8), pp.1-13. 2020

Money, Land or self-employment? Understanding preference heterogeneity in landowners’ choices for compensation under land acquisition in India, (with Patil et al.), Land Use Policy, Vol. 97 (104802), 2020

Food waste due to retail power in supply chains: Evidence from Sweden (with Mattias Eriksson), Global Food Security, Vol. 20, pp. 1-8, 2019

The tree structure - A general framework for food waste quantification in food services (with Eriksson et al.), Resources, Conservation and Recycling, Vol. 130, pp. 140-151, 2018

Environmental consequences of introducing genetically modified soy feed in Sweden (with Eriksson et al.), Journal of Cleaner Production, Vol. 176, pp. 46-53, 2018

The role of access mechanisms in effective rehabilitation of displaced farmers due to development projects (with Vikram Patil and Vinish Kathuria), Journal of Development Studies, Vol. 53 (4), pp. 548-564, 2017

Take-back agreements in the perspective of food waste generation at the supplier-retailer interface (with M. Eriksson, L. Mattsson and A. Istamov), Resources, Conservation and Recycling, Vol. 122, pp. 83-93, 2017

Rehabilitation myths? How transaction costs reduce farmer welfare after land acquisition (with V. Patil), Journal of South Asian Development, Vol 12 (1), pp. 1-17, 2017

Are small firms willing to pay for improved power supply? Evidence from a contingent valuation study in India (with Y. Goyal, J. Rommel and J. Sagebiel), Energy Policy, Vol. 109, pp. 659-665, 2017

The effect of regulatory governance on efficiency of thermal power generation in India: A stochastic frontier analysis (with Vinish Kathuria), Energy Policy, Vol. 89, pp. 11-24, 2016

Modeling transaction costs for a sustainable energy policy: A review and illustration, in ‘Economic Modeling, Analysis and Policy for Sustainability'. Eds. Anandajit Goswami and Arabinda Mishra, IGI Global, 2016 (Book Chapter)

Gas based power generation in India: Lessons from a transaction cost analysis (with Vinish Kathuria), Energy Strategy Reviews, Vol. 8, pp. 1-7, 2015

The transaction costs driving captive power generation: Evidence from India (with Vinish Kathuria), Energy Policy, Vol. 75, pp. 179-188, 2014

Setting targets for costing ecosystem adaptation (with E. Ojea, B.B. Agarwal, P.K. Joshi and Anil Markandya), The International Journal of Ecological Economics and Statistics, Vol.24, Issue 1, pp. 27-45, 2012

Costing adaptation to climate change impacts in forest ecosystems: A case study with experiences from India (with E.Ojea, B.B. Agarwal and P.K. Joshi), International Journal of Climate Change Strategies and Management, Vol. 4, Issue 3, pp. 323-341, 2012

Forest Ecosystems (with Ojea, Agarwal and Joshi) in ‘Costing Adaptation: Preparing for Climate Change in India'. Eds. Anil Markandya and Arabinda Mishra, TERI Press, 2010

Academic Conferences

4th United Nations - Sustainable Development Solutions Network (UN-SDSN) FABLE Meeting, June 4-7,2019, Bogota, Colombia

Community Attributes and Climate Adaptation in Complex Socio-Ecological Systems: A Case Study of Top Down Policies in the Drought-Prone Kutch Region of India, XVII Biennial IASC-Conference ‘In Defense of the Commons: Challenges, Innovation, and Action', July 1-5, 2019, Lima, Peru

2nd United Nations - Sustainable Development Solutions Network (UN-SDSN) FABLE Meeting, June 6-9, 2018, Vienna, Austria

Food waste due to coercive power in supply chains: Evidence from Sweden, 30th International Conference of Agricultural Economists (ICAE), July 28 - August 02, 2018, Vancouver, Canada

Information Institutions, Citizen Participation and Environmental Governance in India, 5th World Interdisciplinary Network of Institutional Research (WINIR), September 14-17, Hong Kong

3rd United Nations - Sustainable Development Solutions Network (UN-SDSN) FABLE Meeting, December 3-6, 2018, Potsdam, Germany

Food waste due to coercive power in supply chains: Evidence from Sweden, 3rd Global Food Security Conference, December, 3-6, 2017, Cape Town, South Africa

1st United Nations - Sustainable Development Solutions Network (UN-SDSN) FABLE Meeting, December 6-8, 2017, Vienna, Austria

The role of access mechanisms in effective rehabilitation of farmers displaced due to development projects, 16th World Bank Land and Poverty Conference, March 14-18, 2016, The World Bank, Washington DC, US

Transaction costs and farmer marginalization in land acquisition, 16th World Bank Land and Poverty Conference, March 14-18, 2016, The World Bank, Washington DC, US

Have independent regulatory agencies improved the efficiency of thermal power generation in India? A stochastic frontier analysis, 19th Annual Conference of the International Society for New Institutional Economics (ISNIE), June 18-20, 2015, Harvard University, Cambridge MA, US

The role of access to de jure rights in resettlement of displaced farmers, 19th Annual Conference of the International Society for New Institutional Economics (ISNIE), June 18-20, 2015, Harvard University, Cambridge MA, US

Transaction costs and farmer marginalization in land acquisition, 29th International Conference of Agricultural Economists (ICAE), August 8-14, 2015, University of Milan, Italy

The Allied Social Science Association (ASSA) Meetings, January 3-5, 2014 Philadelphia, US

Social Information in Collective Action: An Experimental Approach, presented at the 5th Workshop on the Workshop (WOW5), June 18-21, 2014 Indiana University Bloomington, US

The Organization of Energy Supply: Experiences from a Field Application of Transaction Cost Economics, presented at the Seminar on Economic Governance in Agri-Food System, July 10th, 2014 at University of Perugia, Italy

The Methodological Pragmatism of Coase, presented at the Inaugural WINIR Conference, September 11-14, 2014 at Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich, London, UK

Vertical Integration as Firm Response to Electricity Shortages: Does Transaction Cost Economics Sufficiently Explain? (with Vinish Kathuria), presented at the 36th Annual Conference of the International Association of Energy Economics (IAEE), June 16-19, 2013, Daegu, South Korea

Information, Regulatory Commitment and the Investment Dilemma (with Christian Kimmich), presented at the 17th Annual Conference of the International Society for New Institutional Economics (ISNIE), June 20-22, 2013, Florence, Italy

The Role of Recordkeeping and Broadcast in Shaping the Delta Parameters, presented at the Workshop Mini-conference, Vincent and Elinor Ostrom Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, December 16, 2013, Indiana University Bloomington, US

Electricity ‘Make or Buy' for Manufacturing Firms, The Ronald Coase Institute Workshop on Institutional Analysis, December 9-15, 2012, Santiago, Chile

European School on New Institutional Economics (ESNIE), May 15-21, 2011, Corsica, France

Russian Summer School on Institutional Analysis, July 5-11, 2011, Moscow, Russia

Barriers to Governance in Evolving Power Generation Markets, presented at the 34th Annual Conference of the International Association of Energy Economics (IAEE), June 19-23, 2011, Stockholm, Sweden

Transaction Cost Regulation, presented at "Comparative Sub National State Climate Policies - Germany, India and the USA" organized by the Environmental Policy Research Centre, Free University Berlin, October 13-14, 2011, New Delhi, India

Working Papers & Projects

Information, Regulatory Commitment and the Investment Dilemma (with Christian Kimmich), Jerusalem Papers on Regulation and Governance Working Paper No. 51, The Hebrew University

Costs of Governance and The Problem of Private Investment in the Indian Power Generation Sector (with Vinish Kathuria), USAEE Working Paper No. 13-110

An Empirical Transaction Cost Model of Firm's Decision to Make or Buy Electricity (with Vinish Kathuria), USAEE Working Paper No. 13-134

Impact of Regulatory Governance on Indian Thermal Generation: A Stochastic Frontier Approach (with Vinish Kathuria), USAEE Working Paper No. 14-155

Can citizens influence severity of regulatory sanctions in developing countries? The case of Andhra Pradesh pollution regulator (with Keerthi Kiran Bandru and Jens Rommel) (under review)

The methodological pragmatism of Coase (with Ning Wang) (under review)

Do rehabilitation measures from land acquisition match with farmers' expectations? Results from a contingent ranking experiment (with V. Patil and V. Kathuria) (under review)

Reports

Group Captive Power Plants in Small and Medium-Scale Industrial Clusters in India, ‘Financing Sustainable Development: Ideas for Action'. Eds. Mahmoud Mohieldin and Djordjija Petkoski, World Bank Group, Washington DC, 2015

Food Chain Sustainability in Sweden: Value Creation through Research? Report No. 168, Department of Economics, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), ISSN 1401-405X

Performance Evaluation of Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (Part 1): Governance Analysis, Center for Management in Agriculture (CMA), Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, India

Performance Evaluation of Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) – Part I "Governance Analysis", Center for Management in Agriculture (CMA), Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, India

Consulting

COSUS Food Waste: WP 7 – Improved Handling of Suboptimal Food in Supply Chains (Funded by European Union)

MISTRA Biotech I: CP5 – Swedish Competitiveness (Funded by Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research)

WP 3.2.A Energy Management, BMBF-Megacities Sustainable Hyderabad Project, HU Berlin, Germany (Funded by German Ministry of Education and Research)

Fable India Policy Brief September 2021 | Sustainable Food Transformations

Management of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Gujarat

Implications of Covid-19 on Gujarat state from energy, emissions and climate change perspectives [with the support of Department of Climate Change, Government of Gujarat]

Managing Water Risks in Wheat Production in Madhya Pradesh, India [Funded by The Nature Conservancy, TNC]

UN-SDSN FABLE : Designing Evidence-Based Pathways for Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals on Food, Agriculture, Biodiversity, Land Use and Energy

United Nations-Sustainable Development Solutions Network, UN-SDSN and International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis, IIASA).

Performance Evaluation of Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) Crop Insurance Scheme in India (Funded by the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmer's Welfare, Government of India)

The Dynamics of Urban Sprawl: Land-use changes, Food Supply and Sustainable Agricultural Production Systems in the Arid and Semi-arid Zones (Funded by Swedish Research Council, FORMAS)

Farmer Behavior in Dairy Value Chains: Experimental Insights from Peri-Urban Hyderabad (Funded by SLU Global-ICRISAT)

MISTRA Biotech II: Task 3.8 – Price Transmission, Trait Selection and Value Chain Analysis (Funded by Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research)

Food Chain Sustainability in Sweden: Value Creation through Research? – A Background Report (Funded by Acturum Development AB, Södertalje)

Farmer Behavior in Dairy Value Chains: Experimental Insights from Peri-Urban Hyderabad (in collaboration with ICRISAT, Hyderabad)

Awards & Honors

2016 - Won Swedish Research Council's (FORMAS) grant competition worth 1 million USD, to conduct research on ‘The dynamics of urban sprawl: land-use changes, food supply and sustainable agricultural production systems in the arid and semi-arid zones'

2015 - The World Bank and Wharton Business School Ideas for Action (I4A) competition on development finance: Finalist and ‘Honorable Mention' (selected in top 5% from over 430 teams across 130 countries)

2010 - DAAD (German Academic Exchange) Fellow

2011-13 - OFID-IAEE 2011 and 2013 scholarships for the Annual Conferences of the International Association of Energy Economics (IAEE)

In the Media

Integrated land acquisition is key to a pandemic-resilient economy

[BLoC, The Hindu Business Line, April 18, 2020], 2020

The Draft National Action Plan on Business and Human Rights: Can It Be An Important Next Step In Reducing Land Conflicts, Investment Risks?

[Business World, April 10, 2020] , 2020

Teaching Area

Agro-food Value Chain Management and Development