WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – After 38 years spent in higher education – including 15 years at Purdue University – Jim Mintert retired Dec. 31. He had served as director of the university’s Center for Commercial Agriculture.

Michael Langemeier, a professor of agricultural economics at Purdue, has taken over as the center’s director. In addition, Chad Fiechter has been named the center’s new research director.

Mintert now has the title professor emeritus of agricultural economics at the university. Though he has plans to travel, he said he does intend to focus some of his time on the economics of agriculture.

“Agriculture is a fascinating sector of the economy that’s constantly evolving, which is exciting,” Mintert explained. “Farmers are always looking for ways to improve their farm operations and are willing to share what worked for them in the hope that it will help others be more successful. We see this every year when we hold the Purdue Farm Management Tour. I couldn’t ask for a better group of people to work with.

“I’ve also enjoyed my teaching career both at Purdue and when I was on the Kansas State faculty. Teaching class and working with both graduate and undergraduate students on research projects has been a great experience. And I also have to say that the opportunity to work with a great group of faculty colleagues both at Purdue and Kansas State was immensely stimulating and rewarding.”

Mintert spent the first 23 years of his career at Kansas State University before joining the Purdue faculty.

The Center for Commercial Agriculture was launched in 2011. At the time, Mintert was assistant director of Purdue Extension. He participated in the original planning discussions regarding the center’s establishment.

“The primary goal was to re-energize farm management programming targeted toward farm operators who were engaged in production agriculture as a primary source of their family’s income,” he noted. “To do so, we needed to seek external funding for staffing and program development. To obtain funding, the center established an Industry Advisory Council and the agribusiness firms on the council provided a base level of funding for the center. Overall, I think the center has been successful in providing farm management education and information to commercial scale farm operations.”

The center joined forces with CME Group in 2015 to start the Purdue University-CME Group Agricultural Economy Barometer. The barometer provides a monthly measure of production agriculture’s pulse, Mintert said.

“One aspect of the barometer surveys that has proven especially valuable is the opportunity it provides to learn producers’ opinions on emerging topics,” he said. “Recent examples include policy related questions that we included in barometer surveys conducted before and after the 2024 election to learn how U.S. farmers attitudes shifted in response to the election’s outcome.”

He said he’s pleased with the improvements in the center’s online offerings that make its information and programs more accessible. Working with Purdue colleagues such as Langemeier and Chris Hurt, now-retired professor of agricultural economics, Mintert said they developed a strong farm management online presence which includes articles on the center’s website (purdue.ag/commercialag), farm management tools, webinars and videos found on the center’s YouTube channel, and more recently, the Purdue Commercial AgCast podcast series.

Mintert worked with his father on their family farm in Missouri. His father encouraged him to study agricultural economics at Purdue. “I can’t thank him enough for all the discussions we had and the encouragement he provided that led me down this career path.”

Now that he’s retired, Mintert and his wife Susan plan to travel, with Spain as their first destination. After that, he said they’re looking forward to international and domestic travel. They also love the outdoors and will probably visit some state and national parks, Mintert added.