ended over the long term,” he says. “A couple of weeks ago I was in a region where nets had been widely distributed for free, and I saw them used for fencing, in vegetable gardens and as soccer goals.”
Gingrich does his research with Kara G. Hanson and Tanya J. Marchant of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and with Hadji Mponda who recently became Tanzania’s national minister of health. They previously had an article on this subject published in the July 21, 2010, issue of Health Policy and Planning, a bi-monthly issued by Oxford University Press. The article was entitled “Household demand for insecticide treated bednets in Tanzania and policy options for increasing uptake.”
Gingrich brings to his work considerable experience as a Mennonite Central Committee worker on development issues, with three years in Haiti and two in Nepal. He holds a BS and MS in agricultural economics from the University of Illinois and a PhD in economics from Iowa State University.
His malaria-net research was supported by Mennonite Economic Development Associates during a 2007-2008 sabbatical from EMU. In previous years, Gingrich focused his research on the effectiveness and sustainability of microfinance programs and the relationship between economic globalization and agricultural development.