College of Agriculture & Natural Resources Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics

Major Professor: Dr. Mason-Wardell

Area of Specialization: Development Economics

Expected Graduation Date: Spring 2026

Personal Website: https://sites.google.com/msu.edu/yeyounglee/

Publications on Google Scholar

Yeyoung Lee is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics (AFRE) at Michigan State University. Her research focuses on international development, with a particular emphasis on small-scale irrigation technologies, women’s empowerment, and household resilience. Prior to joining AFRE, she interned at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), where she led a study on the gender-differentiated impacts of climatic shocks on agricultural labor in Tanzania. This paper was published in Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy. (See the article here.)

During her time in the AFRE program, she worked as a short-term consultant for the Innovation Laboratory for Small-Scale Irrigation (ILSSI), collaborating with Dr. Elizabeth Bryan and Dr. Claudia Ringler at IFPRI. She led a study on the impacts of small-scale irrigation on women’s time allocation in Ethiopia (as her job market paper). This study has recently been published in World Development. (See the article here.) In addition, she has gained valuable experience as a co-organizer of technical trainings aimed at enhancing the research and policy communication skills of researchers in Africa and Asia affiliated with the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy, Research, Capacity, and Influence (PRCI). She worked with Dr. Nicole Mason-Wardell and Dr. Veronique Theriault at MSU, as well as Dr. Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Dr. Elizabeth Bryan at IFPRI, to co-organize PRCI-Africa technical training modules in collaboration with researchers from agricultural policy research institutes across Africa.