Background:
Cathy’s research agenda includes projects on the adoption of organic farming systems in the United States, the practices and profitability of organic production, and the changing policy and market conditions in this sector. Cathy has also initiated and led planning teams for many USDA organic research and policy conferences, including USDA’s Organic Farming Systems Research Conference—Exploring Agronomic, Economic, Ecological, and Social Dimensions, held in Washington DC in 2011. She was part of the interagency USDA team that established the national standards for organic agriculture in 2000, and was the Economics Editor of Agricultural Outlook magazine in the early 1990s.