Commodity Flow

Survey
1997 – 2017
Iris Ong

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 Outline

Gathering and Understanding the Data

Cleaning and Organizing the Data

Visualizing the Data

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Gathering and Understanding the Data

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 What is the Commodity Flow Survey (CFS)?

“The CFS is a shipper survey of approximately 100,000 establishments from the industries of
What is the
mining, manufacturing, wholesale trade, auxiliaries (i.e. warehouses and distribution centers) and
select retail and service trade industries that ship commodities. Data requested by the CFS includes
Commodity
the type of commodities shipped, their origin and destination, their value and weight, and mode(s)
of transport.”
Flow Survey?
Commodity Flow Survey (CFS) | Bureau of Transportation Statistics (bts.gov)

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 Helpful Links

• Commodity Flow Survey (C

FS) | Bureau of Transportati
on Statistics (bts.gov)
• CFS FAQs | Bureau of Trans
portation Statistics (bts.gov
)
• Key CFS Terms | Bureau of T
ransportation Statistics (bts
.gov)
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Gathering Data
2012, 2017: CEDSCI

• Commodity Flow Survey Tables (census.go

v)

2002, 2007: BTS CFS page

• Commodity Flow Survey Data and Reports

| Bureau of Transportation Statistics (bts.g
ov)

1997, 1993: Transtats

• OST_R | BTS | Transtats

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Standard Classification of Transported Goods (SCTG) In-Depth

SCTG description and code

• 01-05: Agriculture products and fish
• 06-09: Grains, alcohol, and tobacco products
• 10-14: Stones, nonmetallic minerals, and metallic ores
• 15-19: Coal and petroleum products
• 20-24: Basic chemicals, chemical, and pharmaceutical products
• 25-30: Logs, wood products, and textile and leather
• 31-34: Base metal and machinery
• 35-38: Electronic, motorized vehicles, and precision instruments
• 39-43: Furniture, mixed freight and misc. manufactured products

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 Raw Data Clean Data

Cleaning and Organizing the Data

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 Cleaning the Data
Name of Column Column Description Column Type
NAME/GEO_TTL Name of the origin state Character
DDESTGEO_TTL Name of destination state Character
COMM Two-digit SCTG code Number
COMM_LABEL/COMM_TTL Description of SCTG code Character
DMODE_LABEL/DMODE_TTL Description of mode of transportation Character
YEAR Year of the survey Number
VAL Value of the shipment Number
VAL_S Coefficient variance for value Number
TON Weight of the shipment Number
TON_S Coefficient variance for ton Number
TMILE Ton-miles per shipment Number
TMILE_S Coefficient variance for ton-miles Number
AVGMILE Average miles per shipment Number
AVGMILE_S Coefficient variance for average miles Number

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Methodological Changes
2017 Commodity Flow Survey Methodology (census.gov) 10
 Methodological
Changes
2017 Commodity Flow Survey
Methodology (census.gov)

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Methodological Changes
SCTG code name changes
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Visualizing the
Data

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Any Questions or Feedback?

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