While attending the National Association of Farm Broadcasters Convention, Farm Director KC Sheperd spoke to the Associate Administrator of USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service, Joe Prusacki, about current events in the organization.
Early this year, the 2022 Census of Agriculture was released to provide comprehensive data on the agricultural economy down to the county level. Since its release, State and County Profiles, Congressional Districts, and Zip Code Tabulations have also been released.
Coming up in the spring of 2025, the Agricultural Resource Management (ARM) Survey will be released which NASS partners with the Economic Research Service to conduct. The survey’s goal is to gauge the economic health of the farmer, but this year, it will be different. In conjunction with the Census of Agriculture, it will be called the Tenure Ownership And Transition of Agricultural Lands (TOTAL) Survey.
“The idea is that normally, we collect information from producers, but a lot of producers rent land,” Prusacki explained. “What we do with this TOTAL Survey is collect information from the landlords because, in many cases, there are contributions to the farming entity from landlords that are not necessarily captured any other place. It’s been ten years since we last did this, and it gives us a snapshot of the landlord and operator relationship.”
The end-of-year Agricultural Survey will be released soon to gather data on spring-planted crops’ yield production, and January’s survey will be about cattle.
The information gathered in these surveys is not only important to NASS, but also to their partners at the Economic Research Service. NASS works with the Farm Service Agency on cash rents. They coordinate with NRCS on the Conservation Effects and Assessment Program (CEAP).
“We are collecting information for a lot of groups so a lot of people have access to information,” Prusacki commented. “Right now, in farm country, we have relatively low commodity prices, and collectively, we need to be able to make better decisions. You need information to make better decisions. I know it is sometimes tedious to fill out these surveys, but that is the only way we have to gather information to make better decisions for everybody.”
The information provided on these surveys is confidential. Federal law prohibits the sharing of information under the threat of a $250,000 fine or ten years in prison.
“We will never publish data such that identifies who the data was provided by,” he assured. “For example on the Census of Agriculture, if we have information that points to the cattle ranch that everyone knows is the largest cattle ranch in the county, we won’t publish the whole county because somebody will know.”
To see information that has been published, visit the website at www.nass.usda.gov or contact your state statistician (Troy Marshall in Oklahoma) or regional director.
