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Through the mid-year and other quarterly probability surveys, information is collected on acreage, yield, production, and grain stocks on farms. Surveys conducted between quarters are used to gather information on crop conditions and yields; off-farm grain stocks are also measured.
As with the crops program, livestock, dairy, and poultry estimates are based largely on probability surveys. However, near-total counts are made for some items, such as slaughter, cold storage, hatching data, and specialty items. Data are collected through mail surveys as well as face-to-face and telephone interviews.
The many sectors that make up the agriculture industry depend on county estimates when pinpointing production shifts and concentrations, determining sales areas and markets, and locating new processing plants. The county estimates are much more current than those of the only other source of county data, the Census of Agriculture; this substantially increases their usefulness.
Crop county estimates are relied on heavily by government agencies as well. The Federal Crop Insurance Corporation counts on them to calculate premiums and loss payments, and the Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service relies on them as one of the factors in determining crop program payments. State governments use them to administer some of their programs, and to assess the relative importance of agriculture to the total cash receipts of their counties.
Through the SSO's, individual States carry out their own livestock county estimating programs, generally focusing on sectors of the industry most commercially significant to the State -- beef or dairy cattle, hogs, broilers, catfish, and so forth. The type of information quantified at the county level also varies among States; one State may estimate milk production (including number of cows and production per cow), while another may estimate only the number of dairy cows.
Most county estimates are prepared from surveys mailed to a large sample. The samples for these surveys accomplish several important things. Many respondents are included in the sample from one year to the next, so that year-to-year changes can be measured. Farm operation changes detected in the county estimates program are used to update the list frame. Most operators in the sample have not been surveyed earlier in the year, so the individual operator's response burden is minimized.
The current system for county estimates merges the procedures and data with those of other surveys (cattle, sheep, and quarterly agricultural surveys, to name a few). This approach helps to distribute the larger operations within the county estimates, thereby strengthening their validity. The county estimates are also employed in weighting other NASS reports back to the districts to ensure that the reports from a particular district are accorded their proper weight, or significance; those districts with the highest acreage, for instance, receive the greatest weights.
Before the program was instituted, statistically reliable and readily available information on the amount and types of chemicals used in agriculture was quite limited. Consequently, neither USDA nor other concerned parties could respond adequately to questions of agricultural chemical use and its possible effects on food safety and water quality.
The chemical use database is proving an invaluable tool to Federal agencies in assessing the benefits and risks of pesticide use, and to State agencies in determining how well actual agricultural practices accord with environmental quality standards. Moreover, the database is essential to the sound evaluation of existing and proposed programs and policies that could affect food production, consumer prices, and farm income.
The total agricultural work force includes self-employed workers, unpaid workers, and hired employees. Hired workers are classified by the principal type of work they do -- field, livestock, supervisory, or other activities.
Prices paid for production inputs (fuel, electricity, seeds, pesticides, fertilizers, and so forth) are collected quarterly from merchants and dealers selling to farmers and ranchers. The data are used to determine the index of prices paid, an indicator of changes in production costs caused by fluctuations in prices.
Index, price, and expenditure data provide the core of information used to determine farm income, costs of production, and the general economic vigor of U.S. agriculture. The series plays a critical role in the decisions and actions of agricultural policy makers in the public and private sectors.
The farm costs and returns survey (FCRS) reflects the overall condition of the U.S. agricultural economy, and Congress and other government officials rely on its results when making policy decisions. This integrated, multiple frame survey is conducted each year to obtain detailed information about production expenses and practices, farm income, finances, costs of production, and other characteristics of farms and ranches throughout the Nation. NASS shifts the focus of the survey from one year to the next to collect extensive cost-of-production data for specific types of enterprises; the survey will concentrate on corn or wheat one year, and on beef or broilers the next.