Section 2. Instructions on Prices Received by Farmers, on Administered Prices and on Supplementary Information on Primary Crops and Livestock Products

PRODUCER PRICES

Price concept:

• Requested data are annual average producer prices of primary crops and livestock products, possibly at the farm-gate.
• If farm-gate prices are not collected/available in your country, you may use information on unit values as compiled in National Accounts to calculate agriculture value added in the production approach.
• You may also like to provide unofficial or estimated data data for certain products, which you may feel reliable. Unofficial data should be marked by an asterisk (*), estimated data should be marked by an ”F” symbol.
• Should all the above dataset not be compiled, please provide us with available price data (e.g. wholesale price).

Data should be complemented by a note defining clearly the concept adopted.

Many countries impute data for national accounts or other purposes. We would like to receive such imputations, where available, as they are based on local knowledge.

Commodity list: The full list of primary crops and livestock products is given in Annex1. Detailed concepts and definitions can be found in FAO’s publication, ”Definition and Classification of Commodities” (FAO 1996. D/W2979E/1/10.96/500) given in FAO’s web-site at the following address: http://www.fao.org/WAICENT/faoinfo/economic/faodef/FAODEFE.HTM .Based on past experience a sub-list of products has been drawn representing major country products. However, you may like to suggest additional items or propose deletion of a few depending up on current situation.

Selected commodities definitions: Please find below short supplementary explanations for selected items that have often been misinterpreted.

Rice : should be reported in terms of paddy rice.
Nuts : data should relate to the nuts in the shell, or in the husk, but without the outer husks.
Seed cotton, cotton seed, cotton lint : In the case of cotton, certain countries report separately fibres and seeds while others record fibres and seeds together in one single figure reported as seed cotton or unginned cotton. Please be very clear on which commodity your country collects prices whether the seed (cotton seed, code 329), the fibre (cotton lint, code 767) or the seed and the fibre together (seed cotton or unginned cotton, code 328).
Indigenous meat : Meat from animals slaughtered during the year, of indigenous and not foreign origin.
Whole milk : full-cream milk, not skimmed.
NES categories : Some prices are given for ”pulses nes”, ”nuts nes”, etc. This means that an important national production does not fall into FAO commodity list and has been re-coded within the commodity group (cereals, pulses, nuts, etc.) as Not Elsewhere Specified (nes). Please up-date the price series and replace our generic definition by the local product name. If there are more than one commodity in one group falling into the NES category, please add the names and corresponding prices in the table at the end of the questionnaire.

Priority commodities:

• Priority items (P): All together, they represent 95% of the value of production in your country in terms of 1989-1991 international dollar prices. It is of great importance that we receive price data for all these items to up-date benchmark information.
• Other commodities ( . ): These commodities have a very low relative weight in the total value of production. To the extent possible, countries are encouraged to provide this information.

Time series: Data is requested for an 11-year period from 1992 to 2002. We have reported prices previously supplied by your country, so that they can eventually be revised. Reference period is the calendar year. Please specify when average prices refer to the crop year.

Reference Unit: Please provide prices per Metric Ton, MT, (equal to 1 000 kg). If data does not refer to MT, please specify the reference unit used and the conversion factor to the MT.

Missing Prices
Please provide an explanation, if a few price records or the full time series is missing for a given product. For example you may like to state if this product is not included in price data collection because of its low weight in the total value of production or the product is not being marketed. While in the former case, we may request you to provide unofficial data (if available) while in the later case, you may like to suggest that the product should be deleted from the country’s list.

ADMINISTERED PRICES (Support Prices, Procurement Prices, etc.)

The market for certain products may be officially administered by public authorities, which set parameters for production and for payments to farmers to provide direct benefit for foreign trade of commercial crops (e.g. sugar cane) or to safeguard interest of farmers. Concepts of such prices may differ from country to country. Some may term it as target price, others intervention prices, government purchase/procurement prices, or a guaranteed minimum prices. Normally such prices are listed annually and are applicable either to the total country or part of it.

You are requested to report the average procurement prices, the support prices, or any other administered prices as per your country’s practice.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

Currency and currency changes
Indicate clearly the currency in use in your country. If a currency change has taken place in the reference period, indicate clearly which data refers to which currency. Please also add an information note on reference date for the change and the conversion rate between the old and the new currency.

Currency Units
Indicate clearly if prices are given in thousands (x1’000) or millions (x1’000’000) of national currency units.

Exchange rate
Please provide us with the series of (annual average) exchange rates with respect to the US dollar prevalent in your country for further analysis. Requested exchange rates are both official and market rates. Possibly rates should refer to weighted annual averages. If not available, please provide mid-year exchange rates. If not available, please specify the given exchange rates (end-year rate, simple annual average, etc.).

Index number of Producer Prices (PPI), of Wholesale Prices (WPI) and of Consumer Prices (CPI)

Please provide us with the data on index number of agricultural producer prices, index numbers of wholesale prices (of Agricultural and Non-Agricultural products) and the index numbers of consumer prices (on Food and Non-Food products) and indicate clearly the base period of each index.