Hay production statistics

Cliff_Johns · Dec 11, 2004

I've noticed some disagreement on Ag statistics on the the TBN boards with very little specifics to back up positions. Here are two sites that have the hay statistics for Canada and US.

Canadian Hay productions statistics can be found here: Canada
This provides a complete rundown of percentages and amounts and where the hay was produced. Interesting info.

Here is the US ag statistics. There is a section on hay in this PDF. Finding the specific info you want requires some effort. I think it shows Alfalfa at 23M acres and other hay at 40M acres in the US for instance. U.S.

Cliff

Cliff_Johns · Dec 11, 2004

Of course, now that I look, the Equipment utalization thread has some links, which I hadn't noticed since that thread is ostensibly about something completely different. Still, There is remarkable detail about crop use in the US and Canada available on the web right down to county by county breakdowns.

Cliff

slowzuki · Dec 11, 2004

I would have to disagree a bit with their stats for Canada. Being that the Alberta gov. produced it, they sometimes forget that other provinces don't watch farms as closely.

Alberta has very dry climate like the midwest US, the yields in the east are much higher and the farms are smaller. I don't know of any form of reporting available in eastern Canada to get the stats from.
The local farm magaziness do their own surveys because their aren't any figures available.

Ken

Robert_in_NY · Dec 12, 2004

Ken, down here most of the farmers are involved with the county Ag board where the board lets them know about different programs that are designed to help farmers as well as other things to help their farms. By being a part of this board the board knows what the farmers farm and how much as the farmers fill out the information each year. This info then goes to the NY ag office where it is compiled with other counties and then goes to the federal ag board. Does your province have something like this?

cowboydoc · Dec 12, 2004

There is also a mandatory reporting form that you have to fill out as a business owner. This form is required for anyone claiming tax exemption for ag and/or using a federal tax id # for tax purposes. If you don't claim the income on your taxes and/or don't ever claim tax exempt status for ag you don't have to fill it out. But it is a big fine if you don't and you did claim ag status.

slowzuki · Dec 13, 2004

In eastern Canada, there are two reporting tools and neither are really useful. On the sales tax quarterly submissions, I have to report total sales. This includes any hay I sell, any equipment, and lumber, logs, services I give etc. Not all of these are forage related and all they get is one total number.

Income tax one reports total sales of forages, no break down of types.

These are the only two required reporting tools.

Our agricultural services got severely cut when the current goverment came to power, in fact the department was completely cut but then brought back due to protest.

Ken