Working Papers

Find below copies of papers not yet accepted for publication and reports not to be published in journals. Critical comments on these are greatly appreciated.

Published papers are available here, and a list also can be found in my curriculum vita. Anyone desiring reprints of published papers can email me.

  1. Kira Lancker, Lakshmi Iyer, Faraz Usmani, James Allen, Molly J. Doruska, Samba Mbaye, Aminata Sylla, Bineta Sow, Jason R. Rohr, Christopher B. Barrett, "Do private incentives crowd out public good donations? Evidence from a lab-in-the-field experiment," April 2026.
  2. Steven W. Wilcox, Christopher B. Barrett, Nathaniel Jensen, Francesco Pietro Fava, Gerardo E. Soto, Njoki Kahiu, Ying Sun, "The Environmental Impacts of Microfinance: Index-Based Livestock Insurance and East African Rangelands," January 2026.
  3. Digvijay S. Negi and Christopher B. Barrett, "How Do Low-Income Rural Households Smooth Consumption?," December 2025.
  4. Christopher B. Barrett, Nathan Jensen, Karlijn Morsink, Yuma Noritomo, Hyuk Harry Son, Rupsha Banerjee, Nils Teufel, "Long-run Effects of Catastrophic Drought Insurance," December 2025.
  5. Elizabeth J. Tennant, Aleksandr Michuda, Joanna B. Upton, Andres Chamorro, Ryan Engstrom, Michael L. Mann, David Newhouse, Michael Weber, and Christopher B. Barrett, "Nowcasting Disruptions to Human Capital Formation: Evidence from High-Frequency Household and Geospatial Data in Rural Malawi," September 2025.
  6. Kira Lancker, Christopher B. Barrett, Kathryn J. Fiorella, Christopher M. Aura, Hezron Awandu, Fonda J. Awuor, and Patrick Otuo, "Understanding Nutrient–Contaminant Tradeoffs in Fish Consumer Demand: Evidence from Kenya," August 2025.
  7. Seungmin Lee, John Hoddinott, Christopher B. Barrett and Matthew P. Rabbitt, "The Probability of Food Security: A new longitudinal data set using the Panel Study of Income Dynamics," July 2025.
  8. Divya Solomon, Andrew McDonald, Christopher B. Barrett, Prakashan Chellattan Veettil, and Buta Singh Dhillon, "Understanding the Persistence of Rice Residue Burning in Northwestern India: A Mixed Methods Approach," July 2025.
  9. Megan Sheahan, Yanyan Liu, Sudha Narayanan, Christopher B. Barrett, "Disaggregated Labor Supply Implications of Guaranteed Employment in India," September 2020.
  10. Vesall Nourani, Christopher B. Barrett, Eleonora Patacchini, Thomas Walker, "Altruism, Insurance, and Costly Solidarity Commitments," May 2020.
  11. Erin C. Lentz, Stephanie Mercier, Christopher B. Barrett, "International Food Aid and Food Assistance Programs and the Next Farm Bill," October 2017.
  12. Paul Christian and Christopher B. Barrett, "Revisiting the Effect of Food Aid on Conflict: A Methodological Caution," World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 8171, August 2017.
  13. Christopher J. Mills, Nathaniel D. Jensen, Christopher B. Barrett, and Andrew G. Mude, "ILRI Research Report 39, Characterization for Index-Based Livestock Insurance," May 2016.
  14. Megan Sheahan and Christopher B. Barrett, "Understanding the Agricultural Input Landscape in Sub-Saharan Africa: Recent Plot, Household, and Community-Level Evidence," World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 7014, August 2014.
  15. Christopher B. Barrett and Derek Headey, "Measuring Resilience in a Volatile World: A Proposal for a Multicountry System of Sentinel Sites," May 2014, 2020 Resilience Conference Paper 1 - Building Resilience for Food and Nutrition Security - Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. (View on IFPRI website)
  16. Chayanee Chawanote and Christopher B. Barrett, "Farm and Non-farm Occupational and Earnings Dynamics in Rural Thailand," February 2014.
  17. Erin C. Lentz, Christopher B. Barrett, and Miguel I. Gómez, "The Impacts of Local and Regional Procurement of US Food Aid: Learning Alliance Synthesis Report," January 2012.
  18. Christopher B. Barrett and Marc F. Bellemare, "The G-20’s Error: Food Price Volatility is Not the Problem," July 2011.
  19. Christopher B. Barrett, "Assisting the Escape from Persistent Ultra-Poverty in Rural Africa," April 2011.
  20. Andrew Mude, Sommarat Chantarat, Christopher B. Barrett, Michael Carter, Munenobu Ikegami, and John McPeak, "Insuring Against Drought-Related Livestock Mortality: Piloting Index-Based Livestock Insurance in Northern Kenya," June 2010.
  21. Christopher B. Barrett, Arun Agrawal, Oliver T. Coomes, Jean-Philippe Platteau, "Stripe Review of Social Sciences in the CGIAR," August 2009.
  22. Andrew Mude, Christopher B. Barrett, Michael R. Carter, Sommarat Chantarat, Munenobu Ikegami, and John McPeak, "Index-Based Livestock Insurance for Northern Kenya's Arid and Semi-Arid Lands: The Marsabit Pilot," January 2009.
  23. Jean Claude Randrianarisoa, Christopher B. Barrett, and David Stifel, "The Demand for Hired Labor in Rural Madagascar," January 2009.
  24. Christopher B. Barrett, "A Normative Framework for Social Science Activities in the CGIAR," October 2008.
  25. Paswel Marenya, Christopher B. Barrett, and Trudi Gulick, "Farmers' Perceptions of Soil Fertility and Fertilizer Yield Response in Kenya," August 2008.
  26. Paulo Santos and Christopher B. Barrett, "What Do We Learn From Social Networks When We Only Sample Individuals? Not Much," May 2008.
  27. Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Systems and the Escape from Poverty and Ill-Health Traps in Sub-Saharan Africa," May 2008.
  28. Christopher B. Barrett et al., "Human Considerations in Determining Conservation Priorities," Letter to the Editor, Science, April 2008.
  29. Christopher B. Barrett, Michael R. Carter, and Munenobu Ikegami, "Poverty Traps and Social Protection," February 2008.
  30. Christopher B. Barrett, Barry J. Barnett, Michael R. Carter, Sommarat Chantarat, James W. Hansen, Andrew G. Mude, Daniel E. Osgood, Jerry R. Skees, Calum G. Turvey, and M. Neil Ward, "Poverty Traps and Climate Risk: Limitations and Opportunities of Index-Based Risk Financing," November 2007.
  31. Solomon Ngoze, Susan Riha, David Mbugua, Keith Shepherd, Louis Verchot, Christopher Barrett, Johannes Lehmann, Justine Wangila, and Alice Pell, "The Impacts of Household Land Use and Socio-Economic Factors on the Soil Fertility of Smallholder Farms in the Highlands of Kenya," October 2007.
  32. Daniel G. Maxwell, Erin C. Lentz, and Christopher B. Barrett, "A Market Analysis and Decision Tree Tool for Response Analysis: Cash, Local Purchase and/or Imported Food Aid?" May 2007.
  33. Christopher B. Barrett, Erin C. Lentz, and Daniel G. Maxwell, "A Market Analysis and Decision Tree Tool for Response Analysis: Cash, Local Purchase and/or Imported Food Aid?" May 2007.
  34. Christopher B. Barrett, "The United States' International Food Assistance Programs: Issues and Options for the 2007 Farm Bill," February 2007.
  35. Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Aid in Response to Acute Food Insecurity," April 2006.
  36. Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Aid as Part of a Coherent Strategy to Advance Food Security Objectives," March 2006.
  37. Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Aid's Intended and Unintended Consequences," March 2006.
  38. Erin C. Lentz, Christopher B. Barrett, and John Hoddinott, "Food Aid and Dependency: Implications for Emergency Food Security Assessments," December 2005.
  39. Christopher B. Barrett, "Poverty Traps and Agricultural Research: Improving Policies, Institutions, and Technologies to Support Sustainable Poverty Reduction," December 2005.
  40. Erin Lentz and Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Aid Targeting, Shocks, and Private Transfers Among East African Pastoralists," July 2005.
  41. Christopher B. Barrett and Michael R. Carter, "Risk and Asset Management in the Presence of Poverty Traps: Implications for Growth and Social Protection," June 2005.
  42. Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Aid at a Crossroads: The Shared Challenge NGOs Face," April 2005.
  43. Awudu Abdulai, Christopher B. Barrett, and Peter Hazell, "Food Aid for Market Development in Sub-Saharan Africa," March 2004.
  44. A.N. Pell, D.M. Mbugua, L.V. Verchot, C.B. Barrett, L.E. Blume, J.G. Gamara, J.M. Kinyangi, C.J. Lehmann, A.O. Odenyo, S.O. Ngoze, B.N. Okumu, M.J. Pfeffer, P.P. Marenya, S.J. Riha, and J. Wangila, "The Interplay Between Smallholder Farmers and Fragile Tropical Agroecosystems in the Kenyan Highlands," February 2004.
  45. Marc F. Bellemare and Christopher B. Barrett, "An Asset Risk Model of Reverse Tenancy," May 2003.
  46. Christopher B. Barrett, "The Economics of Poverty and the Poverty of Economics: A Christian Perspective," April 2003.
  47. Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Aid Effectiveness: 'It's the Targeting, Stupid!'" December 2002.
  48. Eleni Gabre-Madhin, Christopher B. Barrett, and Paul Dorosh, "Technological Change and Price Effects in Agriculture: Conceptual and Comparative Perspectives," May 2002.
  49. Christopher B. Barrett, "Food Aid and Commercial International Food Trade," March 2002.
  50. Christopher B. Barrett and David E. Sahn, "Food Policy in Crisis Management," January 2001.
  51. Christopher B. Barrett and Thomas Reardon, "Asset, Activity, and Income Diversification Among African Agriculturalists: Some Practical Issues," March 2000.
  52. DeeVon Bailey, Christopher B. Barrett, Peter D. Little, and Francis Chabari, "Livestock Markets and Risk Management Among East African Pastoralists: A Review and Research Agenda," May 1999.