Abstract

The Bureau of Agricultural Surveys (BAS), at present, generates data on crops other than cereals based on non-probability surveys through interview of key informants (traders, Barangay Officials, farmers or Market Managers) using a monitoring form. Aware of the increasing demand for quality statistical data for high value crops, this project is primarily focused on data generation using probability sample surveys. Four high value commercial crops (HVCC) were covered, namely, eggplant, mongo, peanut and tobacco for the province of Isabela. The commercial crops were selected based on their contribution to the national level production. Comparing the results of non-probability sampling (current est.) vs. probability (HVCC est.) the following are noted: (1) HVCC in area for peanut and eggplant are more than 30 percent higher than the current estimates except 98/99 for peanut. However, on production data HVCC estimates are relatively lower ranging from 8-23% and subsequently the yield per hectare ranging from negative 121-33%. (2) HVCC estimates on area for mongo and tobacco are relatively closer with that of current estimates the difference ranges from a negative of 5.0 to a negative of 15.0 percent except 97/98 for mongo.