Welcome!

I am an economist at the Development Impact Department (DIME) at the World Bank in Washington, DC.

I study agriculture, education, and social protection in low- and middle-income countries using experiments and quasi-experiments.

My e-mail address is blerva [at] worldbank [dot] org. Follow me on Twitter for updates on DIME recruitment drives and other opportunities. 

Publications

Testing Willingness to Pay Elicitation Mechanisms in the Field: Evidence from Uganda

Journal of Development Economics 152, 2021, with K. Burchardi, J. de Quidt, S. Gulesci, and S. Tripodi

Moral Hazard: Experimental Evidence from Tenancy Contracts

The Quarterly Journal of Economics 134(1):281-347, 2019, with K. Burchardi, S. Gulesci, and M. SulaimanMedia coverage: VoxDev

Assets or Education? A Multifaceted Education Intervention That Fights Poverty 

with D. Ferris and M. Fornasari

Rewriting, new draft coming soon!

Work in Progress

Liquidity Constraints and Capital Allocation: Evidence from a Selective Trial with Ugandan Farmers

with K. Burchardi, J. de Quidt and S. Tripodi [analysis in progress]

Fostering human capital development through school feeding and teacher incentives: evidence from The Gambia

with Paul Christian, Jonas Heirman, Erin Kelley, Florence Kondylis, Gregory Lane, Simone Lombardini, Astrid Zwager[analysis in progress]

More vegetables, healthier lifestyle? School meals improve children's behavior in Jordan

with Florence Kondylis and Hannah Uckat[analysis in progress]

Livelihood packages and poverty graduation programs: evidence from Malawi

with Emily Beam[baseline completed]