Dr Seife Ayele is a development economist with over 20 years’ experience in research, teaching and development practice. His work focuses on political economy analysis, agricultural commercialisation and mechanisation, enterprise development and youth employment, value chains and industrial policy. He leads the Matasa Fellows Network - a joint initiative of The MasterCard Foundation and Institute of Development Studies - that supports young African researchers to develop policy-relevant research in youth employment. He also jointly leads the Renewable Energy Development Project in Ethiopia – a project that explores challenges of and opportunities for independent power producers. He is currently a fellow in the Business, Markets and the State cluster at the Institute of Development Studies.

Prior to joining the Institute, he directed programmes in Ethiopia providing access to and facilitating adoption of improved agricultural technologies by smallholder farmers. He has also held a Research Scientist position at the International Livestock Research Institute, in Nairobi; and a Research Fellow position at the Open University, UK. He has led and conducted significant research in Africa and Asia, and has extensively published in the areas of agricultural innovations and technology adoption, biotech crops regulation and enterprise development.