Evaluation of Phase 1 Screening for the 1996 Agricultural Resource Management Study

The Agricultural Resource Management Study (ARMS) identifies production practices farm operators use to produce certain commodities, determines the costs to produce those commodities, and describes the economic health of a cross-section of ALL farm and ranch operations. The ARMS design integrated and replaced the Cropping Practices Survey (CPS) and the Farm Costs and Returns Survey (FCRS). The sampling design consists of three phases; a screening phase conducted in early summer, the production practice phase conducted in late summer to early fall and the economic costs and returns phase conducted in late winter and spring. The objective of the screening phase (PI) is to improve the quality of estimates by increasing the number of usable reports (versus sampling from list frame control data only) without increasing the number of field contacts. The screening phase identifies in-business sample units and operations having targeted commodities. State Statistical Offices during PI had the option of contacting operations via a telephone interview or using other sources of information to gather commodity specific information about the sampled operation. The presence or absence of a commodity determined whether the operation was eligible to be selected for a Phase 2 (P2) or Phase 3 (P3) interview. This report examines the effectiveness of PI screening and the efficiency of other screening sources relative to the number of usable reports in P2 and P3.