I am a Ph.D. graduate from the Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education (CERGE-EI), a joint workplace of the Charles University and the Economics Institute of Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. As a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Economics Institute, I focus on the potential role of immigrant networks in shifting trade flows between rich and poor countries, and on the effects on small farmers in poor countries of the independent access to developed markets, as provided by the ever more popular Fair Trade scheme. Furthermore, I worked as a Project Expert for the Czech Ministry of Education ( MŠMT ), where I took part in policy evaluations and background studies within the context of the pending reform of Tertiary Education. The unifying theme of my efforts is the study of mechanisms that improve the access of isolated/disadvantaged agents to the existing market opportunities, be it through social networks (immigration), government policies (education), or independent NGO-driven initiatives (Fair Trade).