Faculty Research Support

Award: EGC Junior Faculty Small and Medium-sized Research Grant

Project Title: Striving for Quality: The Impact of Certification in Rwanda

This project examines how quality certification affects small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Rwanda. In partnership with the Rwanda Standards Board, the researchers will conduct a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the Zamukana Ubuziranenge ("Striving for Quality") program, which provides technical assistance and subsidized certification to participating firms. Using administrative records, firm surveys, and product quality testing data, the study will measure the effects of certification on firm outcomes such as sales, employment, and market access; determine whether certification drives quality upgrading or primarily signals existing quality; and examine how certification influences buyer-supplier networks through quality upgrading spillovers and network restructuring. The project will provide some of the first experimental evidence on the causal impacts of quality certification on firms and production networks.

Award: EGC Small Research Grant

Project Title: Land Consolidation and Agricultural Productivity: Experimental Evidence from Kenya (CINCH)

This project examines how land consolidation affects agricultural productivity in Kenya using an experimental research design. The study seeks to generate rigorous evidence on the impacts of land consolidation, contributing to a better understanding of policies that can improve agricultural productivity and inform rural development strategies. 

Award: EGC Faculty Research Incubation Grant   

Project Title: Export Growth Fund & Certification in Supply Chains 

This project supports two complementary studies examining policies to promote firm growth and export competitiveness in Rwanda. The first evaluates the Export Growth Fund, a government program that provides preferential-rate loans to exporters, using a randomized outreach campaign to measure its effects on credit access, firm growth, export performance, employment, supplier growth, and tax revenues. The second investigates how quality certification affects firms and supply chains through a retrospective analysis of certification records and a pilot of Rwanda's Zamukana Ubuziranenge ("Striving for Quality") program. Together, the projects examine how financial access and quality certification influence firm performance, quality upgrading, and participation in domestic and international markets, while generating evidence to inform trade and industrial policy in low- and middle-income countries.

Award: EGC Faculty Research Incubation Grant

Project Title: The Value of Work

This project examines how wage transparency and job preferences influence labor market outcomes in Brazil. Through a randomized controlled trial conducted in partnership with the Brazilian government, the researchers will evaluate how providing workers with wage information affects bargaining power, job mobility, wage negotiation, and wage equity. A complementary large-scale survey of young adults in Rio de Janeiro will examine preferences for formal and informal employment, including the value placed on wages, benefits, job security, and other workplace characteristics. By combining experimental and survey evidence, the project aims to improve understanding of wage setting, labor market efficiency, gender wage inequality, and the factors shaping workers' employment decisions, with the goal of informing labor market policy in developing countries. 

Award: EGC Faculty Research Incubation Grant 

Project Title: Women’s Political Networks 

This project examines whether cross-party networks of female politicians can increase women's political representation in Nepal. Working with the National Association of Rural Municipalities (NARMIN), the researchers will conduct a randomized controlled trial involving approximately 2,000 women politicians across 100 municipality clusters to evaluate whether regional networking groups improve women's political participation, candidacy, and electoral success. The study will also investigate the mechanisms through which these networks operate— including leadership skills, knowledge, and political connections—as well as potential barriers to women's advancement. By generating rigorous evidence on a scalable intervention, the project aims to inform strategies for strengthening women's political leadership and building more inclusive democratic institutions in newly democratized, lower-income countries.