by David W Brown   Middletown RI   July 2025

Some assemble and analyze world overview information.

Important facts and analyses are brought together in the UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s flagship publication, The State of Food and Agriculture (“SOFA).                                                                                                                                           In 1982-87, I was chief of the group at FAO’s headquarters in Rome who produced SOFA and related diagnostic overviews. This work is valued as background for high-level meetings and action planning, as well as for programs within countries. In recent decades, computerization and internet have done much to help SOFA-related analyses, write-ups and outreach. But experienced specialist skills and multi-cultural understandings are still essential for presenting results in meaningful ways, as well as for work within countries aimed at improving the data sent to FAO-Rome and utilization of the findings.

 

Some provide policymakers, farmers, and others with national information.

The Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in the past at least, has produced solid data and analyses for a wide range of topics — see https://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/  The findings are not buried in highly technical reports. ERS economists have given much attention to boiling results down in objective manner, so that policy makers, concerned groups, and the general public can utilize the studies. A good access point is the ERS Amber Waves magazine, which you can receive regularly on line for free — https://www.ers.usda.gov/amber-waves/

Besides annual data collection, every five years USDA has conducted a national Agricultural Census. This requires staff with skills in statistical sampling, survey design, and data tabulation. See https://www.agcensus.usda.gov

 

Some focus on regional, state, and local policy impacts and socio-economic needs.

A partnership of applied economists is focusing on the economic impacts of regional and local food systems https://localfoodeconomics.com

The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development brings together a lot of information useful to us here in Rhode Island. http://aese.psu.edu/nercrd

Here in Rhode Island, as in many states, what used to be “agricultural economics” at the land-grant university now has much broader scope. See URI Environmental and Natural Resource Economics.  Nearby, at UConn-Hartford there is the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Health. UMass-Amherst has an Experimental Economics Lab. 

Some ag economists are with extension programs that help small farmers to plan production, marketing, and finance.

Cornell offers a very comprehensive set of helps http://smallfarms.cornell.edu/plan-your-farm/selling-what-you-produce/

Rutgers has a unique Annie’s Project for educating women farmers about risk management http://anniesproject.rutgers.edu

Many agri-resource economists in the U.S. belong to the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association. Besides its academic journals, AAEA is providing leaders and the general public with easy-to-read articles that build around contemporary themes. You can access these via the free online AAEA Choices magazine.