Does agricultural economy have a future as a separate discipline?

Fertő, Imre

Keywords: agricultural economy, departments, scientific societies, journals

The scientific community dealing with agricultural economy faces serious challenges. The external and internal conditions of studying the traditional discipline of agricultural economy have undergone radical changes over the last decades. The most significant change has been the declining demand for agricultural economy as a profession and the changes to the structure of this demand. This have led to the reduction of the “visibility” of the profession, which is best indicated by the reduction of the number of the relevant university departments and the stagnation in scientific social life. Scientists working in the field of agricultural economy have so far successfully adapted to the changes, which has led to constant widening of the horizon for agricultural economy. Nevertheless, a clear and forward-looking strategy is needed to preserve agricultural economy as a separate discipline. We must constantly search for new themes which justify the preservation of separate courses at all levels of higher education, as well as the relevant system of scientific institutions. There are no problems in this regard as of yet, as in addition to the old themes the era itself continuously supplies research topics, such as technological changes, healthcare, the environment, globalisation or poverty. Economists, however, need to be able to credibly market these topics to the scientific and political market. It is also important that the heads of current departments of agricultural economy can successfully manage and represent their discipline within the universities. They should appear as a positive example to the heads of the universities rather than as a ‘problem child’.
Finally, regardless of the topics into which research is done in the future, such topics will require a strong background in economic theory and methodology, as to this day this remains our relative advantage to other disciples. Agricultural economy as a scientific discipline can only prevail if the young members receive appropriate education. Addressing this issue would be outside the scope of this article, however.

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