Coherence and comparability

This section covers how consistent these statistics are over time and how comparable they are with those of other regions and countries.

Coherence

Trends for most farm types are subject to annual sample variations, as a small number of farms join and leave the survey each year. Between 2021‑22 and 2022‑23, 31 farms left and 16 new farms entered the survey. In addition, the characteristics of farms which remain within the sample can change between sample years and such changes in the characteristics of the farm may result in reclassification of the farm type. For example, a mixed farm may become a livestock farm following investment in its livestock enterprise.

Table 1 below provides the number of farms in the sample, by farm type, from 2019-20 to 2022‑23.

Table 1: Number of farms in FBS from 2019-20 to 2022-23.

The balance of movement out of, and into, the sample may result in changes to average FBI values compared to what could have been expected if the composition of the sample had not changed over the last year. Replacement farms entering the survey are selected according to farm type, economic size and district to try to achieve and maintain a sample representative of Scottish farms.

Comparability

Data presented as a timeseries are considered to be consistent over time. The current weighting methodology has been applied back to 2012-13 . Comparisons with weighted data prior to this time should not be made because the weighting methodologies are different.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) in England, the Welsh Government (WG) in Wales and the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) in Northern Ireland routinely publish results from their equivalent surveys. These comparable data can be accessed at:

England (Defra) http://www.defra.gov.uk/statistics/foodfarm/farmmanage/fbs/

Wales (produced by IBERS on behalf of WG) https://www.aber.ac.uk/en/ibers/research-and-enterprise//fbs/

Northern Ireland (DAERA) https://www.daera-ni.gov.uk/articles/farm-incomes-northern-ireland

Defra combine results from across the UK to produce UK farm income estimates. These are available at:

Agriculture in the United Kingdom - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Comparable methodology is used to produce estimates across Europe by member states of the European Commission (EC) farm accountancy data network (FADN). More information about FADN methodology and the statistics are available at:

Farm Accountancy Data Network (EU) https://agriculture.ec.europa.eu/data-and-analysis/farm-structures-and-economics/fadn_en

Users interested in comparing results between countries should evaluate the relevant methodologies of sources used.