By Julie Ingwersen CHICAGO, Jan 21 (Reuters) - The American
By Julie Ingwersen
CHICAGO, Jan 21 (Reuters) – The American Farm Bureau Federation, an agricultural commerce group, says confidence is fading within the U.S. Division of Agriculture’s most market-sensitive crop reviews, and the federal government ought to reply by modernizing its know-how and bettering transparency.
The Farm Bureau launched suggestions on Thursday following a four-month assessment by 10 of its farmer members into key reviews launched by the USDA’s Nationwide Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS).
Many of those reviews, that are carefully monitored by world grain merchants, are based mostly on statistical surveys of 1000’s of U.S. farmers who’re queried about crop space, yields and grain inventories. The USDA additionally has its personal “enumerators” who conduct discipline surveys to assist decide the dimensions of U.S. crops.
“Whereas NASS could have a gold commonplace popularity for agriculture statistics globally, U.S. farmers’ confidence of their reviews has sadly declined,” Farm Bureau President Zippy Duvall stated in a press release.
Duvall famous “massive modifications” in among the USDA’s provide estimates during the last two years due partially to hostile climate, together with historic flooding that delayed planting in 2019. The USDA’s crop revisions induced market volatility and “left farmers questioning the company’s capacity to reply rapidly to quickly altering circumstances on the bottom,” Duvall stated.
The newest jolt to markets occurred on Jan. 12 when the USDA’s estimates of the U.S. 2020 common corn yield and Dec. 1 shares fell under a spread of commerce expectations, sending corn costs hovering.
The USDA stated it’s addressing the Farm Bureau’s suggestions. “We really feel assured the objects really useful within the report both are being addressed or are underway, and we look ahead to enhancing our communications within the close to future,” NASS stated in a press release.
The Farm Bureau stated the USDA ought to clarify the methodology of its reviews extra clearly and spotlight main revisions to earlier estimates. It additionally really useful that the federal government enhance its know-how and software program to assist preserve tempo with markets dominated by high-speed computer systems and algorithms.
(Reporting by Julie Ingwersen in Chicago Modifying by Matthew Lewis)
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