ABSTRACT
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has been engaged in the estimation of costs of production of farm commodities since the early 1900s. The Bureau of Agricultural Economics, USDA organized in 1922, was established, in part, to study farmers' costs of production (Mighell). USDA's estimates of commodity cost and returns are currently published in the Economic Indicators of the Farm Sector series. All resources used in the production of a commodity are considered, regardless of ownership. Therefore, an ownership cost for all land, whether owned, rented, or financed, is imputed in a consistent manner. Joint production means that the costs and returns of the primary and secondary commodity cannot be separated. The cost of production versions of the questionnaires are designed to produce precise cost of production estimates for a specific commodity and representative coverage of other desired information.
