Dr Tracy Bradfield is a Senior Lecturer in Economics. She teaches on undergraduate and postgraduate programmes in the Dept. of Economics, and she is currently Co-Director of the MSc Business Economics programme. She has a PhD (Economics), MSc (Business Economics), BComm, and a Postgraduate Certificate and Diploma in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education from UCC.

Her recent research primarily focuses on the application of economic thinking to environmental challenges which includes research in agriculture, multi-functional land use and the circular economy. She also has a keen interest in societal challenges such as the creation of an inclusive labour market. She is a Principal Investigator at UCC’s Sustainability Institute and she is a Committee Member of the Agricultural Economics Society of Ireland.

Dr Tracy Bradfield led two projects on land use in Ireland funded by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), titled 'The Development of Land Use Indicators to Protect Our Natural Environment' and 'Landowners’ Behaviours and Attitudes to Incentives & Interventions for Multifunctional Land Use Outcomes.' She was a member of the Horizon Europe CONSOLE Project which designed and tested different contract types for the managment of agri-environmental climatic public goods across Europe. As Co-PI, she received Irish Grant Aid funding to research ethnic minorities’ knowledge and practices in pesticide use for sustainable agriculture in Vietnam. She is a Co-PI of EPA and SEAI funded projects related to the circular bioeconomy and she researches labour market inclusivity as part of the Horizon Europe SYNCLUSIVE project. 

She currently supervises PhD students in the areas of agricultural economics, climate change mitigation, the circular economy and regional resilience. Many of these students are supported by the Teagasc Walsh Scholarship Programme.