Nicole Widmar is Interim Department Head and Professor of Agricultural Economics. Her teaching, research and Extension activities focus on farm business management and production economics. Nicole strives to conduct applied research that informs decision making on commercial agriculture operations. She is interested in applied work that links farm management with the biological components of on-farm production. Her work incorporates both the economic outcomes of a decision and the uncertainties or efficiencies that arise from the biological process underlying the production process.
In recent years, Nicole has developed a significant portfolio of work aimed at understanding consumer’s perceptions of livestock-derived food products. She has employed her findings surrounding consumer demand for product attributes in various agricultural production models. Nicole conducts inter-disciplinary research that provides support for on-farm decision making regarding technology adoption, analysis of producer costs and benefits associated with alternative production processes, support for management of purchased inputs, and insight into the implications of changing consumer demand and preferences for agricultural producers. Nicole completed her M.S. and Ph.D. in agricultural economics at Michigan State University. Prior to her graduate work, Nicole completed her B.S. degree in Animal Science at Cornell University. Her graduate research focused on the responses of agricultural producers to changing consumer demand for production process attributes.