The Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics at Wisconsin was the first established in the United States. Farm management, marketing, and land economics were early areas of concentration. An international dimension evolved in the 1920s, when faculty organized regular seminars on international land tenure problems.

Today, the department boasts many contributions to the profession. Among its alumni is the largest group of Fellows elected by the American Agricultural Economics Association. Its faculty are regularly called upon to assist with major public policy decisions, such as the 1996 Farm Bill. Through the University of Wisconsin Extension service, the faculty work on applied problems as various as school finance reform, the impact of trade agreements on local economies, and milk pricing and dairy policy. Grants from the National Science Foundation, USDA, the MacArthur and Ford Foundations, the World Bank, the United States Forest Service, the Sea Grant Institute and USAID have supported faculty research in recent years, often with graduate student collaboration.