Students are required to take a total of 12 credit hours of frontiers courses that provide specialized training in the field of their choice. The AEDE frontiers courses cover topics relevant to agricultural economics, environmental and resource economics, regional economics and development economics. Graduate students are given wide latitude to design their own program of study and to choose a dissertation topic. 

In recent years, under the supervision of AEDE faculty members, doctoral students have conducted innovative theoretical and applied research on: 

• agricultural policy and trade
• agricultural finance and risk management
• consumption and marketing economics
• food economics and agribusiness
• environmental and natural resource economics
• international and regional economic development
• poverty and food security
• climate change
• agricultural economics
• spatial and land-use economics
• health economics
• bioeconomics
• experimental and behavioral economics. 

Innovative research that addresses pressing social problems is encouraged, regardless of the sub-discipline of economics with which it may be identified.

Students must complete a minimum of 90 graduate semester credit hours and take the non-credit Math Camp offered by the Department of Economics in July and August, immediately preceding the start of classes in the first year. Students are required to take a minimum of 56 credit hours of in-class coursework. This is comprised of 44 credit hours of required courses that provide a strong foundation in microeconomic theory, econometric theory, applied econometrics and applied welfare as well as 12 credit hours of frontiers courses relevant to the student’s intended research topics to provide more specialized training. 

All additional credit hours cover departmental seminar requirements and dissertation research. Please refer to our curriculum sheets for the first year and second/third years in the PhD program for a more detailed understanding of the required coursework.

In addition to required coursework, students must: 

• Pass a microeconomics theory qualifying examination prior to the beginning of the second year
• Pass the second year manuscript requirement prior to the beginning of their third year
• Pass the candidacy examination and defend their doctoral dissertation proposal, typically before the beginning of their fifth year
• Complete the doctoral dissertation and pass a final oral examination.