Sandra Batie (Co-Chair) is the Elton R. Smith Professor in Food and Agricultural Policy in the Department of Agricultural Economics at Michigan State University (MSU), USA. She has had a distinguished career as an economic policy analyst, specializing in natural resource, agro-environmental and agricultural policy issues at the federal and state levels. She chaired the National Academy of Sciences project that culminated in the 1993 book Soil and Water Quality: An Agenda for Agriculture. Before joining the MSU faculty, Dr. Batie was at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. She has had two sabbatical leaves, the first with the Conservation Foundation and the second with the National Governors' Association, both in Washington, DC. Dr. Batie is past president and a fellow of the American Agricultural Economics Association (AAEA) and the Southern Agricultural Economics Association (SAEA).She holds a B.A. in economics from the University of Washington in Seattle and master's and doctoral degrees in agricultural economics from Oregon State University.