Economics and Management
Administered by the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources
Economics and Management option graduate students study the trade-offs associated with how society interacts with natural resources in order to assess and improve natural resource policy and management. Students focus on trade-offs at many different spatial and temporal scales. Examples include non-market valuation of ecosystem services, optimal management of forest stands with changing climate, carbon and market consequences of using biomass energy, sustainable development and long-term projections of ecological and economic sustainability.
Job Opportunities
Persons graduating from this discipline have obtained employment with state and federal natural resource agencies, private consulting firms, non-governmental conservation organizations, and forest management organizations. Many students continue studies at the PhD level.
Faculty Contacts
- Frederick Cubbage, fred_cubbage@ncsu.edu, 919.515.7789
- Rajan Parajuli, rparaju@ncsu.edu, 919-513-2579
- Leah Rathbun, lrathbu@ncsu.edu, 919-513-1248
- Joseph Roise, joe_roise@ncsu.edu, 919.515.7783
- Erin Sills, erin_sills@ncsu.edu, 919.515.7784
Prerequisites
A Bachelor of Science or Bachelor of Arts degree is required. Students without a background in natural resources or a related field may be required to take up to 12 credit hours of undergraduate course work. Students without a background in intermediate microeconomics may need to take an additional undergraduate course in economics as a prerequisite for courses listed in the technical option core curriculum.
Curriculum
Master of Natural Resources Core Curriculum (required)
| Course | Description | Credit Hours | |
| NR 500 | Natural Resource Management | 3 | |
| NR 571 | Current Issues in Natural Resource Policy | 3 | |
| ST 5** | A graduate level statistics course | 3 | |
| FOR 801 | FER Graduate Seminar (or equivalent seminar course) | 1 | |
| FOR 803 | Research Methods (FER graduate students only) | 1 | |
| Total Credit Hours | 11 | ||
Technical Option Core Curriculum
Students are required to take 9 credits in natural resource economics or management. Courses can be taken from the list below, or others may be substituted with approval of the advising committee.
| NC State | |||
| Course | Description | Credit Hours | |
| ECG (ARE) 436 | Environmental Economics | 3 | |
| ECG 505 | Applied Microeconomic Analysis | 3 | |
| ECG 512 | Law and Economics | 3 | |
| ECG 515 | Environmental and Resource Policy | 3 | |
| ECG 540 | Economic Development | 3 | |
| ECG 548 | International Economics | 3 | |
| ECG (ST) 561 | Intermediate Econometrics | 3 | |
| ECG 700 | Fundamentals of Microeconomics | 3 | |
| PA 511 | Public Policy Analysis | 3 | |
| PA 550 | Environmental Policy | 3 | |
| OR 501 | Introduction to Operations Research | 3 | |
| OR 505 | Introduction to Linear Programming | 3 | |
| BMA 567 | Modeling Biological Systems | 4 | |
| FOR 505 | Forest Management | 4 | |
| FOR 509 | Forest Policy | 1 | |
| GIS 520 | Spatial Problem Solving | 3 | |
| FOR 734 | Advanced Forest Management Planning (prerequisite of FOR 505, OR 501 or higher) | 3 | |
| ST 708 | Applied Least Squares | 3 | |
| ST 732 | Applied Longitudianal Data Analysis | 3 | |
| ST 733 | Applied Spatial Statistics | 3 | |
| Based on student interest, special topics courses (595) with variable credit hours are offered at NCSU including: Non-market Valuation Risk Assessment Pine Plantation Management Survey Methods | |||
| UNC-Chapel Hill | |||
| Course Description Credit Hours PLCY 717 Institutional Analysis for Public Policy 3 PLCY 895 Institutional Analysis for Public Policy 3 ECON 785 Theory of Environmental Policy: Taxes & Permits 3 ENVR 685 Water & Sanitation Planning and Policy in Developing Countries 3 ENVR 785 Public Investment Theory 3 | |||
| DUKE | |||
| Course | Description | Credit Hours | |
| Environ 711 | Energy and the Environment | 3 | |
| Environ 752 | Sustainability and Renewable Resource Economics | 3 | |
| Environ 538 | Global Environmental Health: Economics & Policy | 3 | |
| Environ 520 | Resource and Environmental Economics | 3 | |
| Environ 520D | Economic Analysis of Res & Environmental Policies | 3 | |
| Environ 521 | Resource and Environmental Economics II | 3 | |
| Environ 563 | Economic Analysis & Evaluation for Public Health and Environment | 3 | |
| Environ 640 | Climate Change Economics & Policy | 3 | |
| Environ 680 | Economics of Forest Resources | 3 | |
| Environ 850 | Program Evaluations of Environmental Policies | 3 | |
| Environ 832 | Environmental Decision Analysis | 3 | |
| PPS 580S | Water Cooperation & Conflict | 3 | |
| Based on student interest, special topic courses with variable credit hours are offered at Duke (ENVIRON, PUBPOL) and UNC (ENVR, PLAN) | |||
| Total Credit Hours | 9 | ||
Additional Courses/ Requirements
- 10 additional credits of selected courses are required as selected in cooperation with the student’s advisor and advisory committee, which may include:
- NR 695 Master’s Thesis Research or
NR 693 Master’s Supervised Research (up to 6 credit hours)
Students who do not have a background in natural resources or a related field may be required to take up to 12 credit hours of undergraduate course work that cannot be counted towards the MNR degree program, but this is seldom required.
Total Credit Hours: 30 Credit Hours
Projects
Recent Project Titles
- Financial Analysis of Forestry Incentives Programs
- Program Evaluation of Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program (WHIP)
- Economic Analysis of Forest Plantations on the Hofmann Forest
- Cost of Forest Certification in North Carolina – Southern Center for Sustainable Forestry Project
- Managing hardwood forests for timber and wildlife in the Southeast Piedmont : an analysis of tradeoffs
- A regression analysis exploring the impact that sawmills and production have on Southeast softwood timber prices
- Physical and economic constraints on wetland mitigation sustainability
- A land management plan proposal for Bald Head Island Conservancy’s Maritime Forest Sanctuary
- Forecasting Sustainability: Growth to Removals Ratio Dynamics.
- Assessment of Timber Harvesting and Logging Capacity in North Carolina’s Coastal Plains-A Simulation Approach.
Links/ Additional Information
Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources Prospective Graduate Students website