Department of Agriculture October 4, 2012 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, this notice announces the intention of the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) to request revision and extension of a currently approved information collection, the List Sampling Frame Surveys. Revision to burden hours will be needed due to changes in the size of the target population, sampling design, and/or questionnaire length. Annually, NASS obtains lists of farm and ranch operators from different crop and livestock organizations. Historically we have averaged 500,000 potential new operators each year from these lists. Before adding these names to our list of active operators we will contact the operators to collect basic farming information from them on the size and type of operation. These data will be used to eliminate any duplication we may have with names already on our list. Since the 2012 Census of Agriculture will be conducted in 2013, the sample sizes for 2014 and 2015 will be greatly reduced. Additional questions may need to be added to the questionnaire during the next three years to accommodate any new trends or changes in the farming community that need to be identified (i.e. Organic farming, renewable energy production, expansion of acreage of alternative or specialty crops, etc.).