Agricultural Economics applies economic principles to real world situations around food, land and the environment we live in. Agricultural Economists attend to multidisciplinary in their approach to help solve some of the world’s ‘wicked’ problems.

Such questions an Agricultural Economist may explore include:

·       how do we ensure food security when markets are global?

·       how should we use our land when there are competing pressures for use, such as planting trees or growing energy crops.

·       how can we balance the needs of society with those of private industry in, for example carbon markets, or creating viable livelihoods for farmers and maintaining access to nutritious food?

When we think of the current challenges affecting food and land use systems globally such as: climatic change, obesity and health, the cost of living and the impact on food prices of ongoing conflicts then Agricultural Economists offer tools to unpick these problems.  

Given its applied nature Agricultural Economists come from a range of backgrounds and although they employ a range of economic tools, have embraced different disciplines to offer further and deeper insights into particular problems around resources, equity and distribution.

Agricultural Economists contribute to the development of economic theory but have also been innovators on empirical research methods and, collectively, the profession has a broad set of tools to help tackle the global challenges facing our societies.

Agricultural Economics covers such a breadth of subjects (see figure below!) and to illustrate some of this breadth, think of recent protests by farmers on agricultural reform policy, concerns of isolated communities on access to basic foodstuffs, or disruption in supply chains - all of these aspects whether they be in the Global North or Global South can benefit from tools that Agricultural Economists develop and use!

 Alongside jobs in academic roles many of us work for national and international bodies, such as the World Bank (https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/agriculture) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (https://www.fao.org/economic/esa.) on future proposed policies in a range of countries. We also work for the charity and aid sector to support development and transition to reduce poverty and food insecurity.

Many recent Nobel prize laureates in Economic Sciences worked on multi-disciplinary Economics topics which demonstrates the importance of this approach.  However, not many disciplines manage this interdisciplinary research in such a well-recognised and globally accepted way, and this is why the world needs more Agricultural Economists!

For courses in Agricultural Economics see (we are not responsible for external content):

·       https://www.reading.ac.uk/ready-to-study/study/2024/international-development-and-applied-economics-pg/msc-agricultural-economics

·       https://www.reading.ac.uk/ready-to-study/study/2024/international-development-and-applied-economics-pg/

·       https://www.reading.ac.uk/agri-food-economics-marketing/masters/masters-courses

·       https://studies.ku.dk/masters/agricultural-economics/

·       BA (Hons) Rural Business Management | SRUC

·       https://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/postgraduate/degrees/index.php?r=site/view&edition=2020&id=29

·       https://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/postgraduate/degrees/index.php?r=site/view&edition=2020&id=668

·       https://www.ilr1.uni-bonn.de/afepa/en/afepa-homepage

·       https://www.ncl.ac.uk/undergraduate/degrees/nd61/

·       https://www.ncl.ac.uk/undergraduate/degrees/n280/

·       https://www.ncl.ac.uk/undergraduate/degrees/d455/

·        https://www.ncl.ac.uk/postgraduate/degrees/5237f/ 

·        https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/studywithus/ugstudy/courses/UG/Agricultural-Business-Management-BSc-Hons-U6UAGBSM.html