Shimali Fred is an alumnus of Makerere University, with a Master of Science in Agricultural and Extension Education. Fred is a currently undertaking a PhD in Agricultural and Rural Innovation in the Department of Extension and Innovation Studies at the School of Agricultural Sciences at the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. He has an approved PhD Research study at School level. His areas of research interest include food and agricultural systems; Research methods, extension and training; Gender and agricultural development. Fred serves as a graduate students’ coordinator in the Department of Extension and Innovation studies at CAES. He is currently a Research Associate with Gender-responsive Researchers Equipped for Agricultural Transformation (GREAT) a collaborative Project by Makerere University in Uganda and Cornell University in the United States housed at CAES which is aimed at advancing gender-responsive research in agricultural and Research institutions at national and international levels. Fred has served as a supervisor on different Research projects partnering with Makerere University since 2013 which include ZEF project (University of Bonn Germany), Agriculture Market Support (AMS) WFP project, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) Japan, and Agricultural Investors as Development Actors (AIDA) among others. He has also served as an extension worker trainer on Feed the Future Nutrition Innovation Lab Africa (NILA) Tuskegee University USA Project where he was awarded an appreciation as a trainer. He has done private consultancies on qualitative data analysis and served as a research assistant on different research projects. 

He is one of the runup of the Gender Vision awardee for the first edition with the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) as an early career Researchers.