Marta Favara

Over the past decade, my research has focused on how early childhood experiences of poverty and inequality affect later-life outcomes in nutrition, physical growth, education and skills development in the Global South. My research has shown how social protection and other interventions can mitigate early deprivation effects throughout the life course and has identified windows of opportunity beyond the first 1,000 days. The focus of my current research has expanded to investigate how shocks, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and localized events like the ongoing armed conflict in Ethiopia, impact developmental trajectories. I adopt a multidisciplinary approach, integrating insights from economics, demography, neuroscience, biology, sociology and psychology to explore the complex interplay of economic, biological, psychological, cultural, institutional and social factors in human development and individuals' behaviours and choices.

I am currently the Director of the Young Lives study (https://www.younglives.org.uk/) based at Oxford Department of International Development, University of Oxford. Before joining Young Lives, I worked as an economist at the World Bank (Young Professionals Programme) in the Poverty, Inequality and Gender Unit for the Latin America and Caribbean Region and in the Education Unit for the Africa Region. I have worked in several research projects, survey designs, impact evaluations and policy dialogue with public and private institutions in Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.

See here for publications