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Hema Swaminathan is a Professor at the Centre for Public Policy. Her broad interests are in the areas of poverty and inequality using a gender perspective.
I am on leave from IIMB and currently Senior Economist (Gender), Asian Development Bank, Manila. My research focuses on inequality in income and wealth distributions between men and women, female labour participation in India, and survey methodology to collect improved data on several domains (individual-level data asset ownership and wealth, decision making by women, and women’s engagement with the labour market).
I was co-PI on the India Working Survey that examines labour market experiences (participation, roles, earnings and discrimination) of individuals with marginalized identity using a range of innovative methods. I was PI on the Gender Asset Gap project, a comparative study of Ecuador, Ghana and Karnataka (India). The project demonstrated the feasibility of collecting individual-level data on assets and wealth and has generated the first ever estimates of gender asset and wealth gaps. An article from this project was selected for the 2020 special issue of the Journal of Economic Inequality containing a selection of articles published in the Journal which bring economic perspectives and methods to bear on dimensions of inequality highlighted in the Sustainable Development Goals.
I served on the Standing Committee of Economic Statistics (SCES), Government of India, whose mandate is to review the framework for India’s economic indicators pertaining to the industrial sector, the services sector and labour force statistics. I am also member of the Gender Methods Experts Panel of the CGIAR GENDER Platform Methods Module and the Technical Advisory Group for the Engendering Informality Project, International Labour Organisation (ILO). Previously, I have served on the High Level Panel of Experts (HLPE), and co-author of the report on Food Security and Climate Change, Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, 2011-2012.
JOURNAL PUBLICATIONS (2020 onwards)
WORKING PAPERS
BOOK CHAPTERS
The following reflect current and recently taught courses.
Econometrics; Engaging with Africa; Business, Government and Society; Social & Human Development, Development Economics: Theory and Practice, Evaluation of Public Policy; Analysing Data for Social Policy, A Global Perspective on Gender: From Farm to the Boardroom, Gender, Public Policy and Economic Development
EXTERNAL SERVICE
IIMB
Prof. Swaminathan has consulting experience with several international organisations on policy matters broadly in the fields of gender and development and collection of sex-disaggregated data. The organisations she has engaged with include the Asian Development Bank, The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, International Center for Research on Women, the World Bank, and the United Nations Development Programme (Regional Centre at Sri Lanka).
PhD (Agricultural Economics), The Pennsylvania State University, USA
MSc (Economics), University of Bristol, UK
AWARDS
2018 Shireen Lateef Gender Operations Award for Best Gender Knowledge Product (Asian Development Bank), Measuring Asset Ownership and Entrepreneurship from a Gender Perspective: Methodology and Results of Pilot Surveys in Georgia, Mongolia, and the Philippines. (co-authored with ADB-EDGE team)
FELLOWSHIPS
Non-‐Resident Visiting Scholar, Center for Advanced Study of India, University of Pennsylvania, May-‐June 2015
Global Scholar, Institute for Research on Women, Rutgers The State University of New Jersey, 2014-‐2015
EXTERNAL GRANTS
Social Identities and the Labour Market, Co-Principal Investigator
Initiative for What Works to Advance Gender Equality, 2019-2021
Time Disposition of Women in Rural India; Domestic Duties and Employment, Co-Principal Investigator
Center for Gender Equity and Health, University of California, San Diego 2017-18
Examining the Social Impact of Health Policies in India, Co-Principal Investigator
Sub award from McGill University, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, 2011-17
SPANDAN: Women in Agriculture
Sub award from Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, 2015-17
Gender Asset Gap Project, Co-Principal Investigator
MDG3 Fund, Dutch Government, 2009-11
Vanguard Charitable Trust, 2010-15
Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation, Government of India, 2011-13
UN Women, 2013-2015
Malnutrition in Slums, Co-Principal Investigator
Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation, Government of India, 2011-13
Exploring linkages between women’s property & inheritance rights and their vulnerabilities to HIV/AIDS, and domestic violence in Uganda and South Africa, Principal Investigator
Ford Foundation & Anonymous Donor, 2005-07
Women's property & inheritance rights in the context of HIV/AIDS in South Asia, Principal Investigator
UNAIDS & the Levi Strauss Foundation, 2005-07
Popular Writings
How Marriage and Motherhood Skew the Labour Market, The India Forum, September 23, 2024
