Strengthening Statistics Through the ICARS

This compendium of data is supported by the Interagency Council on Agricultural and Rural Statistics (ICARS). ICARS is the effort of the U.S. Federal Government’s statistical agencies in support of the “Global Strategy to Improve Agriculture and Rural Statistics,” which was developed under the United Nations Statistical Commission. The impetus for the Global Strategy was the recognition that agriculture and rural statistics are declining across the globe at the same time as new data requirements are emerging. ICARS was established in 2010 with approval from the Office of Management and Budget’s Interagency Council on Statistical Policy. ICARS brings together experts from economic, demographic, environmental, and agricultural statistical agencies and from natural resource agencies to improve the coordination and production of national statistics related to agriculture, food, natural resource, and rural data.

ICARS products included on this website were developed in support of the Global Strategy to Improve Agricultural and Rural Statistics:

• Land Use and Land Cover Estimates for the U.S. This document provides a crosswalk between major Federal land use and land cover datasets and provides details on the definitions, coverage, and methodologies used by the agencies.
• Natural Resources Datasets. Federal Departments and independent agencies, along with universities, produce geospatial datasets and maps of natural resources of the United States. This list provides the name of the Department, agency, or university that produced the dataset, the name of the dataset, a link to the data, and a description of the data.
• Biofuels Data Sources. This document is a summary of biofuels statistics and information sources maintained by U.S. government agencies, including the Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, Census Bureau, and Environmental Protection Agency.  Data are related to the feedstock, fuel, and co-product quantities supplied, consumed, and blended with non-biofuels as well as prices of biofuels, feedstocks, and co-products.
• Food-Related Data Sources. Federal Statistical Agencies and the private sector develop and maintain a wide variety of data on various aspects of food markets and consumer food choice behavior. Each of the data sources is designed to cover some, but not all, of the information needed to support key policy issues facing the Nation. This document provides a summary of major sources of food-related data, along with key attributes for each data set and a link to the sources.
• Rural Data Sources. There is a wide range of data sources from Federal agencies that can be used to examine various aspects of rural America. This listing provides a summary of the major Federal sources of statistical data used to analyze rural areas. The data sources are categorized by their content, time period, as well as their geographic coverage.