The Department of Community Development and Applied Economics is pleased to announce that Daniel Tobin, Associate Professor of Community Development and Applied Economics, has been appointed Director of the Ph.D. Program in Sustainable Development Policy, Economics, and Governance (SDPEG). In this leadership role, Professor Tobin will guide the program’s academic vision, research initiatives, and graduate student mentorship in alignment with UVM’s commitment to sustainability and social justice.
About Professor Dan Tobin
Professor Tobin is a rural sociologist whose research focuses on how small- and medium-scale farmers respond to external pressures—from market forces and policy frameworks to environmental change. His work spans the sociology of agriculture, development sociology, political economy of agricultural development, crop‐diversity conservation, and seed systems. He has conducted research in the U.S., Latin America, and sub-Saharan Africa.
Joining UVM in 2018, Tobin holds appointments as Associate Professor in the Department of Community Development and Applied Economics and is a Faculty Fellow with the Gund Institute for Environment. He serves on the graduate faculty of the Food Systems program. Tobin’s academic credentials include a Ph.D. (2014) and M.S. (2011) from Penn State and a B.A. from Bowdoin College.
Professor Tobin is an award-winning educator, having recently received the Kroepsch-Maurice Excellence in Teaching Award (2023) and the Graduate Student Senate Excellence in Teaching Award (2023), among other distinctions.
In the classroom, he teaches courses such as World Food, Population, and Sustainable Development; Political Economy of Sustainable Development; and Community Economic Development. He is known for incorporating both quantitative and qualitative methods, paying close attention to non-economic values—such as cultural, relational, taste, and biocultural heritage dimensions—in how farmers make decisions about crop diversity and sustainability.
About the Sustainable Development Policy, Economics, and Governance Program
The Sustainable Development Policy, Economics, and Governance Ph.D. Program at UVM brings together scholars across economics, policy studies, governance, environmental and social sciences to examine the forces shaping sustainable and just development. Graduates from the program are positioned to contribute to academia, policy, NGOs, international organizations, and public- and private-sector efforts aimed at promoting sustainability, equity, and systemic resilience.