ABSTRACT
Various international organizations publish data on agriculture and food in an electronic format. With any data set (presented in electronic or paper format), it is important first to examine the set for interesting or unusual patterns in the display. These patterns often influence decisions in choosing subsets of data and tools to analyze subsets. Curves that are created in an electronic environment are often formed from straight line segments linking data points, plotted in an x-y coordinate system. Most commonly available spreadsheets and other graphing software can create bar charts, curves, pie charts, and various other visual displays of data. Current computers are excellent at making the fits; thus, the place to question people about curves fit to data is in their choice of curve used to fit data-particularly when projections are made from that fit.
