It May Pay to Fill Out Your Ag Census Online
Every five years the Department of Agriculture sends out a very detailed census form for farmers to prepare and send back. We have already discussed this form with several farmers and as usual it can be very hard to follow the paper form. We have found preparing the form online can save some time and frustration.
This is primarily due to the computer automatically taking you to the next part of form based on how you fill out each answer. This is not true in all cases, but based on our feedback, the online version seems to create less frustration.
This census does provide valuable information to the Department of Agriculture, and thus, should not be ignored.
Paul Neiffer, CPA
Paul Neiffer is a certified public accountant and business advisor specializing in income taxation, accounting services, and succession planning for farmers and agribusiness processors. Paul is a principal with CliftonLarsonAllen in Walla Walla, Washington, as well as a regular speaker at national conferences and contributor at agweb.com. Raised on a farm in central Washington, he has been immersed in the ag industry his entire life, including the last 30 years professionally. Paul and his wife purchase an 180 acre ranch in 2016 and enjoy keeping it full of animals.
I filled mine out online and the website encountered an error when I went to submit.Would be interested to know if anyone else had that problem.