IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/jagaec/v45y2013i01p95-107_00.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do Big Crops Get Bigger and Small Crops Get Smaller? Further Evidence on Smoothing in U.S. Department of Agriculture Forecasts

Author

Listed:
  • Isengildina, Olga
  • Irwin, Scott H.
  • Good, Darrel L.

Abstract

This study sought to determine whether monthly revisions of U.S. Department of Agriculture current-year corn and soybean yield forecasts are correlated and whether this correlation is associated with crop size. An ex-ante measure of crop size based on percent deviation of the current estimate from out-of-sample trend is used in efficiency tests based on the Nordhaus framework for fixed-event forecasts. Results show that available information about crop size is generally efficiently incorporated in these forecasts. Thus, although this pattern may appear obvious to market analysts in hindsight, it is largely based on new information and hence difficult to anticipate.

Suggested Citation

  • Isengildina, Olga & Irwin, Scott H. & Good, Darrel L., 2013. "Do Big Crops Get Bigger and Small Crops Get Smaller? Further Evidence on Smoothing in U.S. Department of Agriculture Forecasts," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(1), pages 95-107, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jagaec:v:45:y:2013:i:01:p:95-107_00
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1074070800004600/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Vogel, Fred A. & Bange, Gerald A., 1999. "Understanding USDA Crop Forecasts," USDA Miscellaneous 320799, United States Department of Agriculture.
    2. Bailey, DeeVon & Brorsen, B. Wade, 1998. "Trends In The Accuracy Of Usda Production Forecasts For Beef And Pork," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 23(2), pages 1-11, December.
    3. Good, Darrel L. & Irwin, Scott H., 2011. "USDA Corn and Soybean Acreage Estimates and Yield Forecasts: Dispelling Myths and Misunderstandings," Marketing and Outlook Briefs 183528, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics.
    4. Tannura, Michael A. & Irwin, Scott H. & Good, Darrel L., 2008. "Weather, Technology, and Corn and Soybean Yields in the U.S. Corn Belt," Marketing and Outlook Research Reports 37501, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics.
    5. Andrew M. McKenzie, 2008. "Pre-Harvest Price Expectations for Corn: The Information Content of USDA Reports and New Crop Futures," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 90(2), pages 351-366.
    6. Wisner, Robert N. & Blue, E. N. & Baldwin, E. Dean, 1998. "Pre-Harvest Marketing Strategies Increase Net Returns for Corn and Soybean Growers," Staff General Research Papers Archive 1367, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    7. Good , Darrel & Irwin, Scott, 2011. "USDA Corn and Soybean Acreage Estimates and Yield Forecasts: Dispelling Myths and Misunderstandings," farmdoc daily, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, vol. 1, March.
    8. Good, Darrel L. & Irwin, Scott H., 2006. "Understanding USDA Corn and Soybean Production Forecasts: Methods, Performance and Market Impacts over 1970 - 2005," AgMAS Project Research Reports 37514, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics.
    9. Phil L. Colling & Scott H. Irwin, 1990. "The Reaction of Live Hog Futures Prices to USDA Hogs and Pigs Reports," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 72(1), pages 84-94.
    10. Hill, Harvey S.J. & Mjelde, James W., 2002. "Challenges and Opportunities Provided by Seasonal Climate Forecasts: A Literature Review," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 34(3), pages 603-632, December.
    11. Hill, Harvey S.J. & Mjelde, James W., 2002. "Challenges And Opportunities Provided By Seasonal Climate Forecasts: A Literature Review," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 34(3), pages 1-30, December.
    12. Sanders, Dwight R. & Manfredo, Mark R., 2002. "Usda Production Forecasts For Pork, Beef, And Broilers: An Evaluation," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 27(1), pages 1-14, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. MacDonald, Stephen & Ash, Mark & Cooke, Bryce, 2017. "The Evolution of Inefficiency in USDA’s Forecasts of U.S. and World Soybean Markets," MPRA Paper 87545, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Bahram Sanginabadi, 2018. "USDA Forecasts: A meta-analysis study," Papers 1801.06575, arXiv.org.
    3. Fiechter, Chad & Kuethe, Todd & Zhang, Wendong, 2023. "Information Rigidities and Farmland Value Expectations," ISU General Staff Papers 202306131414240000, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    4. Raghav Goyal & Michael K. Adjemian, 2023. "Information rigidities in USDA crop production forecasts," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 105(5), pages 1405-1425, October.
    5. Newton, John & Irwin, Scott & Good, Darrel, 2014. "Do Big Soybean Crops Always Get Bigger?," farmdoc daily, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, vol. 4, pages 1-7, September.
    6. Goyal, Raghav & Adjemian, Michael K., 2022. "Information Rigidities in USDA Forecasts," 2022 Annual Meeting, July 31-August 2, Anaheim, California 322339, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    7. Olga Isengildina‐Massa & Berna Karali & Todd H. Kuethe & Ani L. Katchova, 2021. "Joint Evaluation of the System of USDA's Farm Income Forecasts," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 43(3), pages 1140-1160, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bahram Sanginabadi, 2018. "USDA Forecasts: A meta-analysis study," Papers 1801.06575, arXiv.org.
    2. Irwin, Scott H. & Sanders, Dwight R. & Good, Darrel L., 2014. "Evaluation of Selected USDA WAOB and NASS Forecasts and Estimates in Corn and Soybeans," Marketing and Outlook Research Reports 183477, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics.
    3. Berna Karali & Scott H. Irwin & Olga Isengildina‐Massa, 2020. "Supply Fundamentals and Grain Futures Price Movements," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 102(2), pages 548-568, March.
    4. Isengildina-Massa, Olga & Cao, Xiang & Karali, Berna & Irwin, Scott H. & Adjemian, Michael & Johansson, Robert C., 2021. "When does USDA information have the most impact on crop and livestock markets?," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 22(C).
    5. Karali, Berna & Isengildina-Massa, Olga & Irwin, Scott H. & Adjemian, Michael K. & Johansson, Robert, 2019. "Are USDA reports still news to changing crop markets?," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 66-76.
    6. MacDonald, Stephen & Ash, Mark & Cooke, Bryce, 2017. "The Evolution of Inefficiency in USDA’s Forecasts of U.S. and World Soybean Markets," MPRA Paper 87545, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. repec:kap:iaecre:v:15:y:2009:i:4:p:470-482 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Ying, Jiahui & Shonkwiler, J. Scott, 2017. "A Temporal Impact Assessment Method for the Informational Content of USDA Reports in Corn and Soybean Futures Markets," 2017 Annual Meeting, July 30-August 1, Chicago, Illinois 258201, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    9. Michael K Adjemian & Robert Johansson & Andrew McKenzie & Michael Thomsen, 2018. "Was the Missing 2013 WASDE Missed?," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 40(4), pages 653-671, December.
    10. Jeffrey B. Mills & Ted C. Schroeder, 2004. "Are cattle on feed report revisions random and does industry anticipate them?," Agribusiness, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(3), pages 363-374.
    11. Tianyang Zhang & Ziran Li, 2022. "Can a rational expectation storage model explain the USDA ending grain stocks forecast errors?," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 42(3), pages 313-337, March.
    12. Taylor, Christopher W., 2012. "Market Reactions to USDA Reports: State Analysis of Corn Price Response," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124661, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    13. Pruitt, J. Ross & Tonsor, Glynn T. & Brooks, Kathleen R. & Johnson, Rachel J., 2013. "End User Preferences for USDA Market Information," 2013 Annual Meeting, February 2-5, 2013, Orlando, Florida 143007, Southern Agricultural Economics Association.
    14. GwanSeon Kim & Mehdi Nemati & Steven Buck & Nicholas Pates & Tyler Mark, 2020. "Recovering Forecast Distributions of Crop Composition: Method and Application to Kentucky Agriculture," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(7), pages 1-17, April.
    15. Tannura, Michael A. & Irwin, Scott H. & Good, Darrel L., 2008. "Weather, Technology, and Corn and Soybean Yields in the U.S. Corn Belt," Marketing and Outlook Research Reports 37501, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics.
    16. Botto, Augusto C. & Isengildina, Olga & Irwin, Scott H. & Good, Darrel L., 2006. "Accuracy Trends and Sources of Forecast Errors in WASDE Balance Sheet Categories for Corn and Soybeans," 2006 Annual meeting, July 23-26, Long Beach, CA 21332, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    17. Adjemian, Michael K. & Johansson, Robert & McKenzie, Andrew & Thomsen, Michael, 2016. "The Value of Government Information in an Era of Declining Budgets," 2016 Annual Meeting, July 31-August 2, Boston, Massachusetts 235811, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    18. Covey, Theodore & Erickson, Kenneth W., 2003. "Evaluating USDA Forecasts of Farm Assets: 1986-2002," 2003 Regional Committee NCT-194, October 6-7, 2003; Kansas City, Missouri 132405, Regional Research Committee NC-1014: Agricultural and Rural Finance Markets in Transition.
    19. An N. Q. Cao & Michel A. Robe, 2022. "Market uncertainty and sentiment around USDA announcements," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 42(2), pages 250-275, February.
    20. Sanders, Dwight R. & Manfredo, Mark R., 2004. "Predicting Pork Supplies: An Application of Multiple Forecast Encompassing," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 36(3), pages 1-11, December.
    21. Lusk, Jayson L., 2016. "From Farm Income to Food Consumption: Valuing USDA Data Products," C-FARE Reports 266593, Council on Food, Agricultural, and Resource Economics (C-FARE).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • Q10 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - General
    • Q13 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Agricultural Markets and Marketing; Cooperatives; Agribusiness
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:jagaec:v:45:y:2013:i:01:p:95-107_00. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/aae .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.