The 2004 burley and flue-cured tobacco cost-of-production figures will
be the last set of tobacco cost-of-production estimates produced by the
Economic Research Service until enough high- quality data become
available to compute the estimates. Data for the estimates were last
collected in 1995 for burley tobacco and 1996 for flue-cured tobacco.
Estimates were updated yearly, based on annual data on price indices,
yields, interest rates, acreage, and other statistics. Since the last surveys,
many changes have influenced the structure of tobacco farms and enterprises.
While every effort has been made to adjust the cost-of-production
estimates for these changes, it has not been possible to measure and
adjust the costs for all the changes