Charles Y. Okyere holds a Doctor of Agricultural Sciences (Dr. Agr.) degree from the University of Bonn, Germany. He had doctoral (Ph.D.) studies at the Department of Economic and Technological Change, Center for Development Research (ZEF). His doctorate dissertation which was submitted to the Faculty of Agriculture is entitled: Water Quality in Multipurpose Water Systems, Sanitation, Hygiene and Health Outcomes in Ghana.
He is a Lecturer at the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, University of Ghana, Legon. He teaches Project Analysis, Farm Management, Management Accounting and Fisheries Economics, and co-teaches Econometrics and Economic Theory at the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, and Department of Marine and Fisheries Sciences. In September 2017, he was selected as part of ten fellows for the inaugural EIB-GDN Program in Applied Development Finance. As part of the fellowship program, he worked with Arianna Legovini (Manager, Development Impact Evaluation, The World Bank) and Alexandros Sarris (Professor of Economics, University of Athens) as expert advisors. His task was to evaluate the effects of internet services on educational institutions in Kenya. In addition, he has work experience from three countries: Ghana, Germany and Kenya. In July 2021, Charles was selected as a DAAD climapAfrica Postdoc Fellow, working on a project entitled: The Impact of Climate-Smart Soil Fertility Intervention on Food and Nutrition Security of Farm Households in Northern Ghana.
In May 2013, he successfully completed 14.73x: The Challenges of Global Poverty, an online learning initiative of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) through edX. Charles Y. Okyere holds a Master of Philosophy degree in Agricultural Economics from the University of Ghana and also worked with ISSER from February 2012 to September 2012 as a Research Assistant on Ghana Social Opportunities Project (GSOP) and Feed the Future Population Based Survey (FtF PBS). The main activities for these two projects included training data enumerators, conducting a reconnaissance survey, monitoring data collection exercise and supervising data entry, data analysis and report writing. Between 2009 and 2012, Charles Y. Okyere worked for research organizations (including International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and ACDI/VOCA) on a part-time basis on data collection and entry. In 2007, he graduated with Bachelor of Science degree (second class honors (upper division)) in Agriculture Technology (Agricultural Economics and Extension option) from the University for Development Studies, Tamale, Ghana.
His research interest areas include the application of behavioral, experimental and quasi-experimental economic techniques to health, education, agriculture, and welfare. He has skills in conducting socio-economic surveys (for instance, data collection and analysis) and has been involved in the collection of data in several regions of Ghana and Kenya on various development issues, using both quantitative and qualitative techniques. In February 2020 and March 2021, he was part of a research team from University of Ghana, Legon that undertook data collection in Upper East, Upper West and North East regions. He can contribute to teaching, particularly on econometrics, research methods, agricultural, development, behavioral and experimental economics, and application for research funding. He has experience in managing funds for impact evaluations including budgeting and rendering of accounts to the Global Development Network, India and University of Bonn, Germany. Since 2015, he has participated in international conferences with funding from University of Bonn, Germany; Poverty Reduction, Equity and Growth Network (PEGNet), Germany; African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), Kenya; Global Development Network (GDN), India; and other organizations.
He has a fair idea on the use of socio-economic surveys and also a computer literate with good knowledge in computer programs such as SPSS, Microsoft Office, Eviews, Stata and Limdep for data management, data analysis, econometric modeling and report writing. Over the years, he had the opportunity of working with researchers such as Prof. Dr. Joachim von Braun and the late Prof. Kwadwo Asenso-Okyere either as a Junior Researcher or co-author.