Shellye Suttles
Research Agricultural Economist
USDA Economic Research Service
Shellye Suttles is a research agricultural economist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service. Her research examines food-system sustainability, including local and regional food systems, agricultural production, and agriculture’s relationship to climate policy and economic development.
She previously served as an assistant professor at the O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University and as an assistant research scientist with Sustainable Food System Science at Indiana University.
Before entering academia, Suttles was the food policy and program coordinator for the City of Indianapolis Office of Public Health and Safety. Earlier, she worked as an agricultural economist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, following service there as an intern economist.
She began her professional career as a graduate research assistant in agricultural economics at Purdue University. Prior to graduate study, she served as a regional recruiter with the Peace Corps Los Angeles Regional Office and as a sustainable-agriculture animal-husbandry volunteer with the Peace Corps in Guatemala.
She received the Indiana University O’Neill School Faculty and Staff Merit Award for exemplary research during the pandemic in 2021. She also received the U.S. Department of Agriculture Abraham Lincoln Honor Award in 2016, the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association Quality of Communication Award (honorable mention) in 2016, and the USDA Helios Award for research and analysis in 2015.
She earned a Ph.D. in agricultural economics and a master’s in agricultural economics from Purdue University, and a bachelor’s from the University of Southern California.
