His dissertation focused on how the environment can affect agricultural productivity growth and efficiency. Here, he estimated how social, political and economic institutions affected agricultural productivity growth and technical efficiency in countries in South America, using parametric and non-parametric methods. Further, he studied what shaped productivity growth in the U.S. High Plains, at county and farm level, considering not only the use of traditional farm inputs but also the impact of higher temperatures, precipitation, irrigation and soil organic matter.
Among other topics, he has estimated the value of water from irrigation using farm-level survey data, how productivity growth has affected biodiversity in Nebraska, and the impact of higher temperatures on agricultural technical efficiency using DEA analysis.
At EPAR, Federico has been studying issues such as the effect that seed type misidentification has on farmers efficiency, the allocation of agricultural R&D among different sources, and the use of mobile money for Ag-payments in Sub-Saharan Africa. In addition, he is involved with the Global Survey of School Meal Programs, helping the Global Child Nutrition Foundation (GCNF) on its implementation.