The purpose of this report is to improve understanding of USDA crop forecasting methods, performance and market impact. A review of USDA's forecasting procedures and methodology confirmed the objectivity and consistency of the forecasting process over time. Month-to-month changes in corn and...

This study investigates empirical methods of generating prediction intervals for WASDE forecasts of corn, soybean, and wheat prices over the 1980/81 through 2006/07 marketing years. Empirical methods use historical forecast errors to estimate forecast error distributions, which are then used to...

The purpose of this report is to improve understanding of USDA crop forecasting methods, performance and market impact. A review of USDA's forecasting procedures and methodology confirmed the objectivity and consistency of the forecasting process over time. No changes in methodology occurred in...

This article uses Nordhaus' framework to determine the efficiency of the revision process for USDA corn and soybean production forecasts over the 1970/1971 through 2004/2005 marketing years. Positive autocorrelation and consistency of directional changes in forecast revisions suggest these...

USDA World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) price forecasts are published as an interval, but are typically analyzed as point estimates. Thus, all information about uncertainty imbedded in the forecast is ignored. The purpose of this article is to evaluate the accuracy of WASDE...