Seth Meyer, associate director of the Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute (FAPRI) and research professor, Division of Applied Social Sciences (DASS), has been named the USDA’s Chief Economist. Meyer plans to take an extended research leave from DASS to serve in this new role, which he will begin in January 2021.

The Office of the Chief Economist (OCE) is the focal point for economic and policy-related research and analysis for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. OCE aims to inform public and private decision makers by providing unbiased information and data-driven analyses of current and emerging issues impacting agriculture, according to their website.

Meyer joined the University of Missouri College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources in 2019 from the U.S. Department of Agriculture World Agricultural Outlook Board (WAOB) in Washington, D.C., where he had served as chairman since 2015. Previously, he worked as a senior economist with the USDA’s Office of the Chief Economist, and as an economist with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in Rome. Before working in Rome and Washington, D.C., Meyer was previously part of FAPRI from 1997-2011, working his way up to associate research professor and policy analyst.

He is an expert on U.S. and international agricultural commodity markets as well as agricultural and biofuel policy. Meyer received his PhD in agricultural economics from Mizzou in 2002.