Evolution of Land Cover Definitions and Survey for the Economics and Statistics Service

Excerpts from the Introduction: The sampling strategy and techniques employed in the June Enumerative Survey (JES) provides a capability to obtain accurate crop acreage estimates. This approach is well established and is a main vehicle for obtaining state and national data for major crops. During the last two decades land management and land use planning have become important factors in the American society. The loss of prime agriculture land, increased urbanization, and deforestation are only a few of the concerns facing this Nation. The type and amount of land covers currently positioned on the landscape are critical elements of land use management. From this need for land cover information arose the question as to whether or not the JES could be expanded to provide acreage estimates for non-crop land cover types. USDA/ESS has no mandate to collect and report data on land cover types, except crops. Other federal and state agencies such as SCS, FS, and USGS have responsibilities to provide non-crop data. But, if ESS could provide land cover information to these users, then the basic “core costs” of materials and processing can be spread over a wider benefit base. As the Landsat crop area estimates move from the research mode into a production effort, the benefits anticipated for providing land cover data will help justify costs of Landsat regression estimates.