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Food and agricultural systems operate in a highly competitive
global context, and the United States is a major player in these
international markets—the U.S. share of the global market
for agricultural goods averages just over 20 percent. Since U.S.
farms
produce far beyond domestic demand for many crops, maintaining
a competitive agricultural system is critical to ensuring the economic
viability of U.S. agriculture. At the same time, U.S. agriculture
is a diverse economic sector. Differences in commodity type, farm
size, operator and household characteristics, even goals for farming,
affect the competitiveness of individual operations and ultimately
of the sector as a whole.
In recent years, new developments in technology, shifts
in domestic policy, and changes in the rules of trade have altered the competitive
landscape of global agriculture and the challenges facing American
farmers. ERS research focuses on these and other economic issues
affecting the U.S. food and agriculture sector's competitiveness,
including factors related to performance, structure, risk and uncertainty,
marketing, and market and nonmarket trade barriers.
Research on the competitiveness of U.S. agriculture takes place
through three distinct programs:
- Market and Trade Economics,
- Economics of Agricultural Research and Development
and Technological Change, and
- Structure and Financial Performance of the Agricultural
Sector.
ERS's research program on markets and trade looks at economic
factors—both
domestic and foreign—affecting agricultural markets and trade.
Analysis includes investigating the forces that shape global
markets; examining the impacts of agricultural and trade policies;
providing
mid- to
long-term
forecasts
of domestic
and world agricultural market conditions; and assessing the technological,
economic, policy, and institutional forces influencing the performance
of U.S. and world agricultural markets.
Researchers in the economics of agricultural research and development
and technological change program analyze the costs, benefits, productivity
changes, and distributional impacts of new technologies in agriculture.
ERS analysts also assess expenditures, returns, and comparative
advantages of public and private research funding, and relative
productivity growth with respect to the major foreign competitors
of the U.S. agriculture sector.
The structure and financial performance of agriculture program
collects, analyzes, and disseminates data on the financial performance
of farms and farm enterprises, based on annual surveys of the Agricultural
Resources Management Study. ERS economists estimate enterprise costs
and returns and agriculture sector income and estimate how farm
sector financial performance is related to changes in farm policy
and financial viability. The program also assesses structural change
in agriculture, including the factors affecting structural change
and the implications of that change for agricultural, technology,
and resource policy.
Through these three programs, ERS aims to provide science-based
knowledge and analytic expertise for informed policy and program
decisions that will enhance the performance of U.S. agriculture.
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