D2—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, September 19,1981
The USDA even
Les Houck, left, of Agri-Broadcasting, New Holland, in
terviews Bill Kibler, chairman of the Crop Reporting Board.
BY LES HOUCK
Agri-Broadcasting, New Holland
WASHINGTON,D.C. - How
does it feel to be among the first
dozen or so “locked-up” people in
the world to know the size of the
projected U.S. com harvest.
It kinda feels like knowing that
the top roll is about to come up on a
slot machine at Atlantic City and
you just run out of coins.
Or, it could be like knowing that
those prime 50 acres next door can
be bought privately for a song and
your banker says no credit because
you’re over-extended.
I may be exaggerating a bit
concerning such feelings but they
give a good idea of how I and a
selected few other agricultural
editors and broadcasters felt last
Friday when we were literally
locked up by the USDA for a day
until the initial crop report was
given on the expected record U.S.
com harvest.
The security measures are
extraordinary and must rival those
that are taken when the Big 3
political leaders get together for a
summit conference.
For example:
-All the window blinds in the
statistic reporting wing of the
USDA building are drawn and
sealed with a wire and lead seal.
This is to guard against anyone
going to a window and hand
signaling the crop figures to
someone outside.
-All passage ways but one are
sealed off and it is guarded. Only
people with proper credentials are
permitted access.
-No one with passes is permitted
back out until after 3 p.m. - the
closing time for the stock exc
hanges..
-Bill Kibler. chairman of the
Crop Reporting Board, and a
representative of the Secretary of
Agriculture, jointly go to pick up
the mailed-in reports from the
various states. Each carries a
different key and it takes both to
open the box. An armed security
guard accompanies them.
-As they’re picking up the
reports, a team of electronic ex
perts “sweeps” the locked-up area
to make certain there are no
“bugs” or other listening or sen
ding devices.
-Once you’re inside the locked
up area, you’re literally cut off
completely from the outside world.
-All of the elevators are shut off
and the telephones disconnected.
The day of the initial corn crop
report actually begins at 3:30 a.m.
for employees of the Statistical
Reporting Service.
The employees are briefed
during the wee hours of the mor
ning and only then told which
commodity they will be working on
- com, soybeans or whatever.
The same people do not work on
the same commodity all the time.
People are randomly rotated
among the commodities.
law tight is security for first com crop report?
It’s kinda like the teams that
worked on the atom bomb during
World War 11. Each worker
became familiar with only one
small part of the overall
Manhattan Project and never even
knew what the final item was be
was working on.
And security continues in the
locked-up room even during the
issuance of the crop report. Con
spicuous by his apparent un
concern with what is being said is
the alert young man usually in his
mid to late-30’s, dressed in the
conservative suit with the plain tie
whose eyes are trained to never
quit “wandering” around the
room.
Last Friday, the main com
modities of concern were com and
soybeans, which explains the need
for the extra security.
Anyone having exact advance
knowledge that it’s definitely going
to be a record com crop, despite
the mid-West drought, and a near
record bean crop, which was
somewhat of a surprise, could
literally clean up in the com
modities futures markets.
We were told how the crop counts
Gary Nelson, of the Crop Reporting Service, yield is expected to be up 55 percent over last
explains map showing expected corn harvest year. Pennsylvania is up 18 percent. Total for
by state. He's pointing to Nebraska where U.S. is up 16.1 percent over 1980.
wires and seals the drapes
Secretary of Agriculture John Block (left
photo) awaits first corn crop report, while
visiting top ag editors snap his photo. Bill
are made among the 30,000 far
mers who supply information for
the crop reports.
Concerning corn, emphasis was
placed by a speculative study
group on the seven major states
which grow about three-fourths of
the com in the U.S.
Field workers who actually walk
the fields are told exactly bow
many steps they should take from
the side of the field and how many
steps from the end of the field.
They use this same specified plot
from the time the com plant begins
to peek through the ground until
after the combines have cut their
way through.
For Friday’s report, the field
workers had to measure each ear
of com in the plots. Why? Because
a difference of two-tenths of an
inch in length of an ear can amount
to a difference of three bushels per
acre in yield.
Lesher, assistant secretary for economics,
pours over some statistics as aides look on.
It was noted that there is a
changing trend in the way farmers
are cooperating with supplying
information. Previously, the
larger farmers were more
receptive to giving the in
formation. Now, the trig boys are
holding back more and the smaller
farmers are more receptive to
help.
Kibler explained that 95 percent
of farmers take the time to work
closely with the Crop Reporting
Service.
Most farmers, he explained,
know that an accurate harvest
report is essential for all farmers
to help them determine how much
of their crop should be stored, fed
or marketed immediately, or how
much should be planted next year,
or how much it may cost to buy
feed for livestock during the
coining winter.
The Crop Reporting Service is
very proud to be a non-political
branch of the USDA, Kibler said.
And the employees take great
pride in being able to provide an
accurate, unbiased report.
No one, not even the Secretary of
Agriculture, can get advance in
formation before that report is
released in the locked-up room, he
stressed.
And what about the future?
Well, Charles Caudill, director of
the Statistical Research Division,
says that satellites will play an
increasingly important role in
counting crops.
One of the new satellites can
photograph com fields in lowri
under cloud cover at night and telr
the difference between corn and
soybeans. But it can’t tell the
difference between com and a 50-
loot wide strip of trees.
But, Caudill stressed, no in
formation is more valuable than
that gathered by the field workers
in the farmers’ fields.
Was my trip to Washington with
people like the editors of Farm
Journal and Successful Fanning to
see the crop reporting procedure
worthwhile?
I was convinced beyond any
shadow of doubt that nowhere in
the world is information more
accurately collected or more
closely guarded than in the Crop
Reporting Service of the USDA.