Packaged Foods & Meats Data: Products, Prices, Recalls, Trade and Demand · Head-to-head
USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System (GATS) vs World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators
Which packaged foods & meats data: products, prices, recalls, trade and demand data fits your job: USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System, or World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators. API, files, or your warehouse. Daily, weekly, or hourly.
USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System (GATS)
World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators
Where the fields line up
No shared field names. These two answer different questions.
| Field | USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System | World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators |
|---|---|---|
partnerCode | Two-character partner country code identifying who the United States traded with - the key every bilateral cut groups on. | not in this set |
commodityCode | HS-10 commodity code on the Census-sourced monthly series, or the HS-6 aggregation on the UN ComTrade series - the distinction between 'which exact cut of meat' and 'which food group'. | not in this set |
year | Calendar year of the trade record. | not in this set |
month | Month of the Census trade record, 1 through 12; Census applies corrections retroactively to prior months. | not in this set |
unitOfMeasureId | Identifier resolving the unit of measure - kilograms on most meat lines - against the published units table. | not in this set |
regionCode | Geographic region code associating the partner country with a world region for rollups. | not in this set |
customsDistrictCode | US customs district of entry or exit where the district detail is requested - the port-side lens on the same flow. | not in this set |
reporterCode | UN ComTrade reporter country code, present on the annual HS-6 series where any reporter country can be read, not only the United States. | not in this set |
dataReleaseDate | Timestamp of the last release of the Census or UN Trade data behind the row, so incremental synchronization pulls only what changed. | not in this set |
indicator | not in this set | Identifies which series the observation belongs to, carrying both the mnemonic code and the full series name. |
country | not in this set | The reporting economy - two-character id plus name. Regional and income aggregates ride the same field as sovereign states. |
countryiso3code | not in this set | ISO three-letter economy code for the observation; the stable join key against your own geography master. |
Coverage, side by side
| USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System | World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators | |
|---|---|---|
| Geographic | `regionCode` mapping partners to geographic regions | Aggregate economies included alongside countries in the 265-economy store |
What each contains
Pick by fit, not by loyalty.
| USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System | World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators | |
|---|---|---|
| Observation period | `year` plus `month` (calendar year and month of the trade record) | `date` (year of the observation, stored as a string) |
| Economy identifier | `partnerCode` (two-character partner code, e.g. CH) | `country` nested object with ISO2 id and name, plus `countryiso3code` (e.g. USA) |
| Measure selector | `commodityCode` (HS-10 line, or HS-6 for the UN ComTrade layer) | `indicator` object naming the series id, e.g. AG.PRD.FOOD.XD, food production index |
| Observed quantity | Trade value per row, qualified by `unitOfMeasureId` resolved against Census and FAS units | `value` (index points on the 2014-2016 = 100 base) with `decimal` display hint |
| Geographic roll-up | `regionCode` mapping partners to geographic regions | Aggregate economies included alongside countries in the 265-economy store |
| Subnational detail | `customsDistrictCode` for US district of entry or exit | None - national level only |
| Reporter identity | `reporterCode` (UN ComTrade reporter code, e.g. IN) | Not separately modelled - the country is always the subject |
| Observation status | Retroactive Census corrections surfaced through `dataReleaseDate` vintage stamps | `obs_status` flag beside each value (missing-estimate markers) |
| Dataset freshness stamp | `dataReleaseDate`: timestamp of the latest release of the underlying records | `lastupdated`: date the indicator dataset was last refreshed |
What each does better
USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System
Commodity resolution on the flows themselves. HS-10 is where the industry actually lives - specific cuts of meat, prepared foods, named product lines - and GATS reports dollar values for each line, each partner, each month. A production index cannot tell you whether Japan took more frozen beef in March than in April; these rows can, and ranked by partner they become an export-lane map overnight. Since January 2021 data the series applies the WTO definition of agricultural trade, so the aggregates line up with how USDA reports trade to agreements. See harmonized system codes for the taxonomy underneath.
Customs-district geography on the US side. A dedicated district dimension breaks US trade by district of entry or exit - the finest spatial cut either record offers, and one the World Bank family explicitly lacks. Port-level questions - which gateway a category moves through, where congestion or enforcement bites - start here. See customs districts.
Ready-made analytical shapes. Beyond raw queries the interface wraps the numbers in BICO Reports at both HS-10 and HS-6, Processed Food Reports, Top Products, Top Partners and Global View analytics, backed by seven product-group reference tables (BICO HS-10, BICO HS-6, Processed Food, WTO HS-6, Harmonized, FAS FATUS, Organics-Selected) plus partner groups, states, ports and units of measure. Corrections ride in openly: Census revises months retroactively and each release carries its own timestamp, so vintages are distinguishable rather than silently overwritten.
World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators
Global breadth without an American lens. The index covers 200-plus countries and economies - roughly 265 economies times about 65 years per indicator in the WDI store - while GATS' Census layer describes US trade and only its UN ComTrade layer reaches other reporters, then annually at HS-6 rather than monthly at HS-10. For any question whose unit is country, not lane, the index starts 200 rows ahead.
Six decades of history. Coverage runs from 1961 to the most recent available year; GATS' documented monthly examples reach back through 2010, with deeper history reachable through its full query interface. Trend work across the 1970s-1990s - structural adjustment, green revolution echoes, long diet transitions - belongs to the World Bank series.
A family around food output, not a single number. Alongside the headline food production index sit the crop production index, the livestock production index, cereal production in metric tons, fertilizer consumption, agricultural land and arable land - enough to separate crop from animal output, which any trade total blends together.
Comparability by construction. A fixed 2014-2016 = 100 base makes an Ethiopian and a Brazilian reading directly commensurable in a way dollar flows never are. The record ships three verified US sample rows so the shape is visible before you commit: 99.64 in 2019, 103.12 in 2020, 104.57 in 2021, easing to 100.86 in 2022.
The verdict
Verdict: sample both, pick by fit - because the choice is a question-shape choice, not a quality ranking. If you are sizing markets, USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System (GATS) is the instrument: monthly dollar flows per HS-10 meat and processed-food line, ranked by partner, filterable down to a single customs district, with BICO groupings that match how trade policy counts things. If you are benchmarking economies, World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators wins: one comparable index point per economy per year on a fixed base, with crop and livestock siblings for decomposition, and history deep enough to span entire policy regimes.
Neither wins on craft - 8/10 against 8/10 is the rubric calling them equally well-documented, which they are. Cut each sample against the question you actually hold: a lane map needs months and product codes; a cross-country growth panel needs years and a common base.
Sample both, pick by fit. See USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System · See World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators
Fair questions
Is USDA FAS Global Agricultural Trade System (GATS) better than World Bank - Food Production Index & Food Commodity Indicators?
Different instruments for different questions - both score 8/10 on the Datadory rubric. GATS wins when the question lives in commerce: monthly US export, import and re-export dollars at HS-10 detail by partner country and customs district. The World Bank index wins when the question lives in output: annual food, crop and livestock indices for 200+ economies from 1961 on a fixed 2014-2016 = 100 base. Sample both, pick by fit.
Do the two datasets overlap anywhere?
In scaffolding, not substance. Both reduce a food-system fact to an economy, a period and a measure - partner code against country code, year-and-month against year, commodity code against indicator id - so a join is straightforward. What they measure rarely collides: one counts goods crossing the US border, the other counts production staying home. Only the US appears in both as a first-class subject.
Which of the two reaches further back?
The World Bank index, by three decades: 1961 onward, roughly 65 years per economy per indicator, against documented monthly depth through 2010 on the GATS Census layer (its full query interface reaches further). For anything predating 2010 - long-run diet transition, structural adjustment-era output - the index is the only one of the two still standing.
Which should a market-research team sample first?
Sample both, pick by fit. Export-market sizing, competitor lane-tracking and import-exposure screens start with [GATS](/datasets/packaged-foods-meats/usda-fas-global-agricultural-trade-system-gats), where every month arrives with partner and district detail. Country benchmarking, category-growth narratives and macro features start with [the World Bank index](/datasets/packaged-foods-meats/world-bank-food-production-index-food-commodity-indicators). Patterns per role sit in our [market researchers use cases](/for/market-researchers/packaged-foods-meats) and [investors & quants use cases](/for/investors-quants/packaged-foods-meats). Samples are cut to your countries, commodities and periods either way.