Farmers don’t trust USDA’s crop numbers. But they do trust the person at their local Farm Service Agency office.
Those are two of the themes from an October survey of 1,199 farmers by Ag View Solutions where 73% rated their confidence in USDA crop data a 1 or 2 on a five-point scale, and just 4% gave it a 4 or 5. The average was 1.93. A matching 73% rated their local FSA office a 4 or 5, for an average of 3.97.
The survey is not a random sample. Shay Foulk, consultant at Ag View Solutions, says it went out to subscribers of the Standard Grain podcast on YouTube, more than 35,000 of them, and on his own social media, mainly X. It reflects farmers who chose to respond. They came from 38 states, led by Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska and Indiana, and their median operation is 1,750 acres. Nearly all grow corn (96%) and soybeans (91%).
The backdrop: USDA’s corn data controversy
Farmers’ doubts about USDA’s corn numbers come after a messy October. USDA’s Oct. 9 Crop Production report raised the national corn yield forecast to 181.2 bushels per acre, up 2.4 bushels from September’s corrected 178.8, and the corn market sold off sharply.
Analysts then questioned Nebraska, where the October yield jumped to 188 bushels from an original September figure of 177, and where the field sample shifted from about 90% nonirrigated in September to about 55% irrigated in October.
On Oct. 23, the National Agricultural Statistics Service acknowledged a September processing error. A day later it blamed incorrect acreage weights in Kansas and Nebraska, corrected Nebraska to 182 bushels and the national figure to 178.8, and said its October forecast stands. The correction moved the national number by only 0.3 bushels, but it did not settle the questions about Nebraska or the process.
A trust gap between national and local
Foulk says the low marks are reflecting a sentiment beyond just one report.
“A compilation of events that have happened over what I will call the last 7 years,” he says, starting with the 2019 crop, which he says farmers knew was short but USDA did not correct in a major way until 2020.
Respondents’ written answers point the same way. Of 888 who described events that broke their trust, 27% cited late revisions and corrections and 26% cited market swings and timing.
The local office is a different story.
“There’s a disconnect between what the national federal messaging is, and then what’s actually being implemented at the local level,” Foulk says. He notes that FSA staff help farmers with planted acres, reporting and program enrollment.
Why farmers skip USDA surveys
Only 38% of respondents say they filled out a USDA survey in the past 24 months. Among the 605 who skipped one and gave a main reason, 34% said they don’t feel it matters, 29% said it takes too much time, 24% said the information is redundant and 13% said they don’t want to share.
Foulk points to the format.
“These surveys come in the mail, or they are asked over the phone. They are pages and pages thick, they take hours for the farmer to complete, and they have redundant data,” he says.
He also says many respondents wrote that they never received a survey at all.
“It’s incredible the amount of people that responded and said, I’ve never received a survey,” he says.
Foulk describes “the repeating cycle of negativity.” Bad sentiment leads farmers to skip surveys, which produces incomplete data, which worsens sentiment. The farmers who do respond mostly say the data matter: 54% believe the data are important and 19% say it is their duty.
Fix one: use the tools that exist now
Asked what would restore trust, 33% of respondents chose USDA partnering with private industry companies for better data, and 30% chose a radical change in surveys and reporting. In separate written answers, 23% suggested using FSA, RMA and crop insurance data, and 12% each pointed to satellite and AI tools or to private and independent data.
Foulk says the 33% surprised him. He compares USDA’s approach to the military’s. The military leans on private competencies to design and build its aircraft. Foulk says the survey shows an opportunity to tap outside expertise, and the USDA does not use company data to the extent farmers know it exists.
“The technology is here,” Foulk says.
Fix two: lean on local FSA offices
Foulk’s second idea is to put the most trusted part of USDA at the center of data collection. He would ask local FSA offices to help run surveys. Some farmers will still want paper, but he says it should be two pages, and staff could call and ask, “hey John, can I get 8 minutes of your time?”
“You are leaning into a trusted resource, people are more likely to fill it out, they’re more likely to give good information,” he says.
Fix three: hold town halls
Foulk also proposes a one-time national listening day, possibly in February, run through local FSA offices. Farmers would fill out the same survey, about 30 minutes, on a phone or in person, and the results would upload to one central system. A 90-minute listening session would follow, recorded and transcribed with an AI tool, and the survey results and transcript would go to USDA as one database of concerns and solutions.
“It’s not a listening panel at the county fair, it’s not a working group of key farmers,” he says. “I think it takes something drastic like this.”
There is some evidence of interest. In the survey, 61% of respondents say they would join a local listening session.
