The Ohio Field Office is the main agricultural data gathering agency in the state with the purpose of collecting, compiling and providing current statistics. This service is provided in cooperation with the USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), the Ohio Department of Agriculture and Ohio State University.

The primary goal of the Ohio Field Office is to provide agricultural commodity producers with unbiased and reliable information to assist them in making production and marketing decisions. Other important data users are farm organizations, agribusiness and transportation firms, state and national policy makers, and foreign buyers of agricultural products.

NASS Field Offices collect and analyze data which are used to prepare statistical estimates. The Ohio Field Office submits these recommendations to its national headquarters in Washington, D.C. Commodity experts review all State recommendations and issue State and National estimates to the public on scheduled release dates throughout the year.

Cooperative agreements with State governments permit additional estimates to be made at the State and/or county level for some commodities. Farmers and agribusinesses provide the data which are collected through a broad program of sample surveys throughout the year. Survey data are collected by mail or through interviews conducted by telephone or in person. Statistics compiled by the Ohio Field Office are published nationally along with other states in NASS agricultural statistics Board reports, and are summarized locally in state-level reports throughout the year. Mailed hard copy reports are available by subscription.