Joy Harwood is director of the Economic and Policy Analysis Staff (EPAS), a position she has held since March 2006. Her staff offers current insights into the market and policy issues affecting commodity programs, the farm credit situation, and the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), and is frequently called upon to brief policy officials on a wide variety of topics. EPAS analysts contribute to the monthly interagency process that produces USDA's monthly World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates report. EPAS is also responsible for tracking foreign investment in agricultural land under the Agricultural Foreign Investment Disclosure Act and calculating approximately $1 billion in assessments paid by tobacco firms annually under the Tobacco Transition Payment Program.

Prior to moving to FSA, Harwood spent 19 years at USDA's Economic Research Service (ERS), where she served as deputy director for Market Outlook from 2001 to 2006, and chief of ERS's Field Crops Branch from 1996 to 2000. Earlier in her career, she managed ERS's risk management research project where she helped analyze and assist in the development of revenue insurance and other new programs for the USDA's Risk Management Agency.

Harwood is a three-time recipient of the Secretary's Honor Award, one of the highest awards given by the Secretary of Agriculture. In 1996, she was named "USDA Economist of the Year." She co-taught the USDA Graduate School course, "Understanding USDA's Farm Programs" over a 10-year period with her husband, Craig Jagger, chief economist for the House Committee on Agriculture.

A native of Illinois, Harwood grew up on a corn and soybean farm that has been in her family since the 1850s. She earned her bachelor's degree in agricultural economics from the University of Illinois, and master's and doctorate degrees in agricultural economics from Cornell University. Harwood and her husband have two daughters and reside in Maryland.