WASHINGTON, D.C. — To better provide data about U.S. agricultural commodities consumed for grain and fuel alcohol, as well as oilseed production and flour milling, the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) on Feb. 19 released its first Grain Crushings and Co-Products Production report under its new Current Agricultural Industrial Reports (CAIR) program.

“Data from the CAIR program are crucial to U.S. economic policy, help industries analyze markets, plan, forecast and make well-informed business decisions,” said Joseph Reilly, NASS administrator.

According to the USDA, the first report of 2015 provides data from October-December 2014, with subsequent reports scheduled published monthly.

Reilly said certain publications, which included data about agricultural manufacturing, were previously part of the U.S. Census Bureau’s Current Industrial Reports (CIR) program, which began in 1904. Because of budget reprioritizations, however, the bureau discontinued its data collection for the CIR program in 2011.

But, “given its long and well-respected history of gathering and publishing agricultural data,” he said, Congress authorized and appropriated funds for NASS to design and implement the CAIR program. The USDA stated last September it worked with 200 U.S. ethanol production facilities representing capacity of 14.792 billion gallons of annual production, and surveyed 183 flour milling facilities with a reported 24-hour milling capacity of almost 1.6 million cwt.

The USDA said key highlights of the first report of 2015 include:

•Total corn consumed for alcohol and other uses was 510.1 million bushels in December 2014. Total corn consumption was up 5 percent from November 2014 and up 7 percent from October.

•Sorghum consumption for fuel alcohol was 889,000 cwt. during December 2014. Total sorghum consumption was down 57 percent from November and down 53 percent from October.

•Dry mill co-product production of distillers dried grains with solubles (DDGS) was at 1.9 million tons during December 2014, up 8 percent from November and up 3 percent from October.

•Wet mill corn gluten feed production was at 329,400 tons during December 2014, up 12 percent from November and up 3 percent from October.

In addition to the Grain Crushings and Co-Products Production report, the USDA stated other publications scheduled to be released within the CAIR program include Flour Milling (quarterly beginning May 1), Cotton System (monthly beginning May 1), Fats & Oils: Production, Consumption and Stocks (monthly beginning Aug. 3) and Oilseed Crushings (monthly beginning Aug. 3).

Clarke McGrath, Iowa State University extension field agronomist, recently named the on-farm research and extension coordinator at ISU’s new Iowa Soybean Research Center, spoke last week at meetings for Newell-based Market 1, Inc.-Futures Forecasting and Risk Management. He could envision a company like Market 1 incorporating information from the reports into its analysis, forecasts and other information it uses to help growers with marketing. “I could see grain elevators maybe finding this sort of information useful as well,” he added.

When gathering data for the reports, Reilly said NASS safeguards the privacy of all survey respondents, ensuring no individual respondent or operation can be identified – especially since participation in the CAIR program is both required and protected by law (Title 7, U.S. Code).

“The NASS collects information directly from industry representatives who participate on a confidential basis,” he said. “Confidentiality rules require reporting data only in aggregate form. The NASS cannot report data where a single producer dominates a production category and could be identified.”