Economic Impact Analysis
People
The EIAP is comprised of a core group of administrative staff, faculty, research associates, and students as well as affiliated faculty and student members that contribute to specific projects and efforts.
Administrative Staff
ResearchGate | Google Scholar Christa is an Assistant Professor of Regional Economics in the Food & Resource Economics Department and serves as the Director of the UF/IFAS Economic Impact Analysis Program. Prior to coming to UF, Christa was a contract economist to the Department of Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory. She holds undergraduate degrees in Economics and Spanish from Middle Tennessee State University and Master’s and Ph.D. degrees in Economics from West Virginia University. Her research interests include disaster impact assessment, regional economic modeling, economic impact analysis, and connections in human and natural systems. She is leading numerous funded research projects involving regional economic modeling and has a growing list of related publications and other outputs. Christa holds affiliate faculty status with Florida Sea Grant, UF School of Natural Resources and Environment, the UF Water Institute, the UF/IFAS Food Systems Institute, the Regional Research Institute at West Virginia University, and the University of the Westfjords in Ísafjörður, Iceland. Outside of the office she enjoys spending time outdoors with her family and taking a variety of classes at the Gainesville Circus Center. |
Kelsey joined the program in 2020 after graduating with a bachelor's degree in Neuroscience from the University of California, Santa Cruz. She has experience collaborating with stakeholders across departments to improve policies and practices particularly pertaining to the library system and related resources. While pursuing her degree she also gained experience in Geographic Information Systems and had the opportunity to tie together spatial and socioeconomic characteristics to better understand and model a potential regional public health issue. She is greatly interested in continuing to learn and pursue interdisciplinary research and understanding the downstream economic impacts of decision-making and policy. |
Research Assistant Professors
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Postdoctoral Research Associates
Bijeta is a Postdoctoral Associate in the Food and Resource Economics Department. She holds BSS (2013) and MSS (2015) degrees in Economics from the University of Dhaka. She came to the University of Florida in 2016 and joined the Economic Impact Analysis Program team in 2019. Her current research focuses on sustainability issues that are relevant to Florida. She uses quasi-experimental methods for measuring the impacts of environmental dis-amenities such as point sources of toxic releases or hazard events. She hopes her research will be able to answer pertinent questions that will help policymakers and stakeholders to make informed decisions. She looks forward to finding a position within an academic or a state/federal agency that will allow her to work with an interdisciplinary team to find solutions to complex issues at the intersection of human and environmental systems. |
Student Research Assistants
Roberto was born and raised in Caracas, Venezuela, and spent part of his childhood in Gainesville, Florida. He graduated from Iowa State University with a bachelor's degree in 2007 and obtained a master's degree at the University of Miami in Marine Affairs and Policy in 2011. He worked for over ten years with the Center for Independent Experts (CIE), which operates the independent peer review system for NOAA Fisheries. He joined the Ph.D. program in Food and Resource Economics in August 2020 and began his research assistantship with Dr. Christa Court at the UF/IFAS Economic Impact Analysis Program. His research interests are non-market valuation systems for ecosystem services and natural resources, spatial analysis applications for valuation methods, valuation of natural disaster impacts, and economic policy analysis.
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CV Ming is a PhD candidate in the Food and Resource Economics Department and a Graduate Research Assistant with the UF/IFAS Economic Impact Analysis Program. Before joining FRE, Ming earned a BS in Applied Mathematics from Northwestern Polytechnical University in 2015 and a MS in Population, Resources and Environmental Economics from University of Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2019. He came to the University of Florida and joined the Economic Impact Analysis Program team in 2019. Currently, his primary research interests include Environmental Economics, Regional Economics, Applied Econometrics, and Input-output Analysis. Since May 2021, Ming has been working as an intern with Andre Avelino and Patrick Lamers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), to evaluate the socio-economic impacts of bio-fuel industry in the U.S. Ming loves to play tennis, badminton, and video games in his free time. After completing his Ph.D., Ming is planning to find an academic position in universities or research institutions.
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Julia is in her final year as an undergraduate student in the Economics Department at UF. She came to the University of Florida in 2020 and joined the Economic Impact Analysis Program team in 2021. She will graduate with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics in May 2023. Julia will begin graduate school in the Fall of 2023 and will pursue her Master of Arts in Economics at UF. She has completed an economist internship at the USDA and has accepted another internship with a federal government agency for the summer of 2023. Her current research interests include food and resource economics topics such as food security, conservation, and sustainability. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her family, friends, and labradoodle. |
Stowe Dinenburg - Undergraduate Student Stowe is a third-year undergraduate in the Economics Department at UF. He is pursuing degrees in economics and mathematics in the graduating class of 2024. He came to the University of Florida in 2020 and joined the Economic Impact Analysis Program team in August 2022. His current research interests are valuation of ecosystem services, disaster impact analysis, regional economic analysis, and sustainability. He plans on pursuing graduate study in economics or a closely related field in the future. In his free time, he enjoys playing tennis, kayaking, spending time with family and cheering on the Gators. |
Other Members and Affiliates
ResearchGate | Google Scholar Alan Wade Hodges is an agricultural economist with 34 years experience at the University of Florida-Institute for Food and Agricultural Sciences, Food & Resource Economics Department in Gainesville, Florida. Before his retirement in 2019, he served as Director of the UF Economic Impact Analysis Program and served in numerous leadership roles for UF-IFAS Extension education and outreach programs. He has conducted research studies on a broad range of issues and industries, including agriculture, forestry, fisheries, environmental horticulture, bioenergy, healthcare, higher education, natural disasters, tourism and recreation. He received Master’s and Doctoral degrees in Agricultural and Biological Engineering from the University of Florida, and a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Chicago. Alan is a native of Iowa and lives on a small farm in Alachua County, Florida. Among his academic career accomplishments:
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Assistant Research Scientist |
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Fei He Affiliate Post-Doc |
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Past Members
- Dr. Joao-Pedro Ferreira
- Research Assistant Professor
- joao.ferreira@virginia.edu
- Dr. Robert Botta
- Postdoctoral Research Associate
- robert.botta@noaa.gov
- Ethan Lantzy
- Undergraduate Research Assistant
- lantzyethan@ufl.edu ; LinkedIn
- Rika Orlando, M.S.
- Graduate Research Assistant
- e.orlando@ufl.edu ; ResearchGate
- Dr. Joao-Pedro Ferreira