Latest News

Several trainings are being held throughout the US for potential applicants to the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program. The Northeast trainings are being held in Pennsylvania (Altoona, Lancaster, and Scranton) and in Moorefield, WV.

Investing in education may help boost economic opportunities for the next generation, according to a team of economists including Northeast Center Director Stephan Goetz.

Case studies are a valuable way to synthesize and share lessons learned to create new knowledge and enhanced applications in practice. The National Extension Tourism (NET) Design Team is inviting submissions of case studies that highlight innovative and promising practices in sustainable tourism.

We are pleased to announce that Heather Manzo has joined the Northeast Center as its Associate Director for Extension, effective January 2018. In this role, Heather will work with Extension Educators across the region to identify opportunities for cross-state collaborations and sharing of programs, and will help document the impact of Community and Economic Development Extension programs across the region.

In 2017, the Northeast Center continued its work of growing strong, collaborative networks with our land-grant partners, numerous federal agencies, and private institutions. We worked on a number of research and outreach projects that reached thousands of people. Read all about it in our latest annual report!

A paper titled "The Economic Status of Rural America in the President Trump Era and beyond" was published this month in a special issue of Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy and was authored by Center Director Stephan Goetz, Mark Partridge (Ohio State University), and Heather Stephens (West Virginia University). The special issue is a collection of papers around the theme “The Future of Agricultural and Applied Economics,” and is the culmination of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association Agenda and Priorities initiative. The authors review the current economic conditions of rural America and the current literature, in order to set the stage for future research aimed at developing public policies that support economic prosperity in rural areas.

The overprescribing of opioid-based painkillers may be the main driver of the increased abuse of opioids in rural America, but new research by Northeast Center Director Stephan Goetz and Meri Davlasheridze (Texas A&M) suggests that other factors, including declining farm income, extreme weather and other natural disasters, may affect a crisis that is killing thousands of citizens and costing the country billions of dollars.

For seven years a multidisciplinary team of more than 40 researchers led by the NERCRD has explored the extent to which a more robust regional food system in the Northeastern U.S. could improve food access in low-income communities and improve the long-term food security of the entire Northeast. Now, in an initial collection of three papers published in the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development, team members have summarized some of their findings.

For the first time, researchers at Cornell University have analyzed where Northeast supermarkets source the foods they sell to their low-income customers. These case studies offer policymakers a better understanding of how regional food systems could bring healthier food to low-income people in the Northeast. They were conducted as part of the NERCRD-led project, Enhancing Food Security in the Northeast through Regional Food Systems (EFSNE).

A first-of-its-kind study looking at the intersection of health insurance and agriculture sheds light on a “Catch-22” situation that many farmers know all too well: while having health insurance is a critical risk-management strategy, the cost of health insurance and out-of-pocket health care costs can be burdensome to farm families and may limit investments in farm enterprises. The findings have important and timely policy implications, as lawmakers are debating both the 2018 Farm Bill and health insurance policy.

The 2018 Northeast Agricultural and Resource Economics Association (NAREA) pre-conference workshop, co-sponsored by the Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development, will be held on June 9-10, 2018, just prior to the NAREA conference taking place June 10-12 in Philadelphia, PA. This pre-conference workshop will highlight recent advances in the economic analysis of food systems in the U.S. as well as globally.

A newly published book co-edited by Don Albrecht, Scott Loveridge, Stephan Goetz, and Rachel Welborn includes chapters from nationally known experts from throughout the U.S. to provide insight to help understand and address the difficult housing concerns within rural areas.

A recently published paper by Douglas Arbogast and Megan Smith (WVU) was recognized as outstanding by members of the Tourism and Leisure Studies Research Network. Arbogast's tourism research also was published in the journal Sustainability.

The mission of USDA's Economic Research Service (ERS) is to anticipate trends and emerging issues in agriculture, food, the environment, and rural America and to conduct high-quality, objective economic research to inform and enhance public and private decision making. Two new reports highlight how ERS research is used on the ground.

The National Association for Community Development Extension Professionals (NACDEP) will be holding its annual conference in Cleveland, OH, June 10-13, 2018. This year's conference theme is "Communities that Rock."

The Extension Disaster Education Network (EDEN) invites you to explore its new website and programming resources. EDEN Community and Economic Development (CED) delegates have expanded resources for communities as they prepare for, recover from, and mitigate disasters.

"Urban Agriculture: A Guide for Municipalities" was developed through a partnership between the University of Pittsburgh Institute of Politics and the Allegheny County Conservation District, with help from several local and regional partners. The guide describes the benefits of urban agriculture and its many activities for healthy, vibrant communities, and walks the reader through how these activities can be properly and legally permitted through changes to local zoning ordinances. (Links to PDF)

The Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences is seeking an individual trained in agricultural economics, demography, sociology, rural sociology, geography, economic and community development, and/or related field to join its nationally recognized Energy, Business & Community Vitality Unit within Penn State Extension. The individual will provide applied research support to Penn State Extension’s Energy, Business and Community Vitality Unit, connecting local opportunities and challenges associated with community, economic, and agricultural business development to sound science.

The 2018 Northeast Agricultural and Resource Economics Association (NAREA) Pre-Conference Workshop, co-sponsored by the Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development, will be held on June 9-10, 2018, in Philadelphia, PA.

We are pleased to welcome several new scholars to the Northeast Center!