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Department of Agriculture

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  • Research topics
    • About my region: regional profiles
    • Agricultural outlook
      • Agricultural overview
      • Australian crop report
        • National overview
        • New South Wales
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        • South Australia
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        • Western Australia
      • Beef & veal
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      • Australian rice markets in 2020
      • Water market outlook
      • Commodities and trade data
      • Historical agricultural forecast database
      • Definitions
      • Previous reports
    • Biosecurity
      • Biosecurity economics
        • A benefit-cost framework for responding to Varroa
        • Benefits of increased access to minor use chemicals
        • Biosecurity control strategies for red imported fire ants
        • Biosecurity response options for black-striped mussel
        • Consequences of a foot-and-mouth disease outbreak
        • Economic consequences of a scrapie outbreak in Australia
        • Economic impacts of Xylella fastidiosa on the Australian wine grape and wine-making industries
        • Estimating the value of Australian biosecurity arrangements for equine influenza since the 2007 outbreak
        • Farm gate value of biosecurity
        • Potential impact of the wheat steam rust strain Ug99 in Australia
        • The impacts of Xylella fastidiosa on Australian horticulture and the environment
      • Biosecurity sciences
        • Treated ballast water and its impact on port water quality
      • Biosecurity engagement
    • Climate and drought
      • Agricultural Data Integration Project
      • Farm performance and climate
      • Measuring drought risk
    • Fisheries
      • Fishery status reports 2021
      • Fisheries and aquaculture statistics 2020
        • Australian fisheries and aquaculture production
        • Australia’s trade in fisheries and aquaculture products
          • Market access improvements: A case study of stone fruit exports to China
        • Seafood consumption in Australia
        • Employment in Australian fisheries and aquaculture 2019–20
        • About this report
        • Other useful information
        • Economic concepts in Australian fisheries and aquaculture statistics
      • Fisheries data
      • Fisheries economics
        • Australian fisheries and aquaculture outlook
        • Australian fisheries economic indicators
      • Fisheries research
        • Allocating fish stocks between commercial and recreational fishers: examples from Australia and overseas
        • Shark assessment report 2018
    • Food demand in Australia
      • Trends and issues 2018
      • Trends and food security issues 2017
    • Forests
      • Forest economics
        • Australian forest and wood products statistics
          • Socio-economic indicators—trends to 2018
        • Forest economic research
          • A framework for developing medium term projections of traded wood products
          • Economic potential for new plantation establishment in Australia
          • Future opportunities for using forest and sawmill residues in Australia
          • Illegal logging regulation: analysis of regulated importers by business size
          • Productivity and efficiency of the Australian sawmilling industry
          • Responsiveness of demand for structural pine to changes in timber and steel prices
          • Short-term forecasts of selected wood product sales volume: Method and assumptions
          • Upscaling the Australian softwood sawmill industry
        • Plantation and log supply
        • National wood processing survey
      • Forest sciences
      • Forest data
      • Forests overview
    • Invasive species
      • Distribution and impacts of established pest animals and weeds
      • Exotic invasive species with environmental impacts
      • Prioritising targets for biological control of weeds
      • The National Priority List of Exotic Environmental Pests, Weeds and Diseases dataset
      • The state of weeds data collection in Australia
      • Wild dog research
    • Labour
      • Australian agricultural workforce: Stocktake of data sources
      • Previous research
      • Trends in the Australian Agricultural Workforce
    • Land Use
      • Catchment scale land use of Australia - Commodities - Update December 2020
      • Catchment scale land use profiles
    • Agricultural productivity
      • Agricultural productivity estimates
      • International comparisons
      • Measuring productivity
      • Pathways to sustainable and productive agriculture
      • Productivity data
      • Productivity drivers
        • Seasonal workers and working holiday makers comparison report
      • Productivity introduction
      • Productivity publications
      • Related research
        • Labour force survey
        • Rural research, development and extension investment in Australia
    • Social sciences
      • Australian marine pest network analysis
      • Biosecurity research
      • Climate research
      • Community engagement
      • Community involvement in plant biosecurity
      • Human dimensions research
      • Making general surveillance work
        • General surveillance case study overviews
        • Guidelines for general surveillance programs
        • Literature review: Understanding general surveillance as a system
        • Research report: Making general surveillance programs work
        • Stocktake of general surveillance initiatives
      • Natural resource management
      • Pest animals and weed management survey
      • Recreational boat operators’ self-management of biofouling in Australia
      • Social aspects of weed management
      • Social impact assessment
    • Farm surveys and analysis
      • Farm performance
      • Farm survey data
      • Disaggregating farm performance statistics by size
      • Previous research
    • Trade
      • Australian wine in China: Impact of China’s anti-dumping duties
      • Case study of Australian citrus exports
      • Case study of cattle exports to ASEAN countries
      • Agricultural export price and volume indicators
      • Analysis of government support for Australian agricultural producers
      • Australia's biosecurity market access and agricultural exports
      • Impacts of COVID-19 on Australian agriculture, forestry and fisheries trade
      • Non tariff measures affecting Australian agriculture
      • Overview of recent ABARES China research
      • Research on agriculture, trade and COVID-19
      • South America: an emerging competitor for Australia's beef industry
      • South American wine industry
      • The future of Chinese agricultural policy
      • Understanding how China's tariff on Australian barley exports will affect the agricultural sector
    • Water
      • A model of water trade and irrigation activity in the southern Murray-Darling Basin
      • Future scenarios for the southern Murray-Darling Basin: Report to the Independent Assessment of Social and Economic Conditions in the Basin
      • Measuring water market prices
      • Murray-Darling Basin water markets: trends and drivers 2002-03 to 2018-19
      • Murray-Darling-Basin water market dataset
      • Trends in water entitlement holdings and trade: Analysis of ABARES survey data
      • Water Market Outlook – August 2021
    • Agricultural forecasting
      • Changes to reporting of marketing year data
      • Farm share and price spread
      • Farmers' terms of trade: Update to farm costs and prices paid
      • Forecasting national grain stocks in times of drought
      • Seasonal climate scenarios for medium-term forecasts
      • Summary of ABARES agricultural forecasting
      • The future of public sector forecasting in Australian agriculture
    • Working papers
      • Discount rates and risk in economic analysis
      • A micro-simulation model of irrigation farms in the southern Murray-Darling Basin
      • A model of spatial and inter-temporal water trade in the southern Murray-Darling Basin
      • Defining drought from the perspective of Australian farmers
      • Introducing ABARES farmpredict
      • Non-tariff measures: A methodology
      • Simulating the effects of climate change on the profitability of Australian farms

Agricultural forecasting

ABARES has provided forecasting services for agriculture since 1948. With production decisions often made before prices are known, forecasts help farmers manage risk. Consumers benefit through the availability of high quality and reasonably priced food. Providing information on expected prices also helps to ensure that markets operate fairly. In addition, forecasts are used to identify and form policy responses to emerging issues.

ABARES is continually improving its forecasting services in response to changing demand, and welcomes feedback on their future design.

Latest research

The Australian Agricultural Forecasting System (AAFS) - System documentation

The Australian Agricultural Forecasting System (AAFS) is the system that ABARES uses to produce forecasts for Australia’s agricultural markets. Although AAFS has been in development and use since 1945, this is the first time that it has been documented.

Documentation supports peer review and provides end–users with confidence that ABARES forecasts can be relied on. It facilitates collaboration with other forecasting agencies around the world and helps to train new generations of forecasters.

Published: 31 March 2022

Seasonal climate scenarios for medium-term forecasts

A challenge for ABARES medium-term forecasts of agricultural markets is that no reliable seasonal climate forecasts exist beyond the current growing season in southern Australia.

To date, ABARES has addressed this problem by assuming a return to average seasonal conditions.

This assumption poorly reflects the seasonal conditions actually faced by Australia's agricultural industries and it ignores the fact that climate variability has an impact on expected medium-term production.

Farmers' terms of trade: Update to farm costs and prices paid

This paper reports on the results of an update to the way ABARES calculates the farmers' terms of trade (FToT) indicators. This includes updates to the price indexes for farm outputs and inputs to production, and measures of farm costs and net farm returns. These indicators are used together with other data and information to monitor the performance of the agricultural sector.

The last major update of the FToT was conducted in 2004–05. This update seeks to address data availability and quality concerns, which have arisen gradually over time. The aim of this update is to improve the accuracy of the indicators and to ensure the ongoing delivery of the FToT indicators. Data sources were reviewed and outputs consolidated where necessary.

Published: 3 March 2020

Exploring how public sector grain stock forecasts can help reduce market uncertainty

This reports says that public reporting of national grain stocks in years of drought can help grain consuming businesses work out whether and when to invest in the cost of importing. The project extended the methodology used to produce the Australian Crop Report to validate ABARES forecasts of consumption and stocks.

ABARES concluded that public reporting of national grain stocks in years of drought can help grain consuming businesses work out whether and when to invest in the cost of importing. However, in years conducive to crop production and exports, it is not efficient for ABARES to commit additional resources to estimating grain consumption and stocks.

Published: 20 November 2019

Performance and accuracy of ABARES agricultural forecasts analysed

The Summary of ABARES agricultural forecasting paper analyses the performance and accuracy of ABARES agricultural forecasts in the Australian crop report and Agricultural commodities publications between 2000–01 and 2017–18.

Historically, ABARES September forecasts have an average forecast error of: 11 per cent for total winter crop production, 2 per cent for total meat production, 10 per cent for global indicator prices averaged across major commodities, 6 per cent for the total value of agricultural exports and 15 per cent for export volumes across commodities.

Published: 13 June 2019

The future of public sector forecasting in Australian agriculture

This report explores what the forecasting services provided by ABARES should look like into the future. The operating and policy context of Australian agriculture has changed dramatically since the Bureau of Agricultural Economics was established in 1945. This report explores whether ABARES forecasting services have adapted to these changes, and what changes still need to be made.

The report argues that ABARES should work more closely with users to tailor forecasts to policy and commercial applications. ABARES forecasting methods and services should become more participatory, and adapting them to new policy and business issues as they emerge. ABARES forecasting services should evolve towards a complementary focus on foresighting to help governments and industry manage longer-term global change.

Published: 21 November 2018

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Last updated: 31 March 2022

© Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment

We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of country throughout Australia and recognise their continuing connection to land, waters and culture. We pay our respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.