Adam Sparger
AMS Transportation and Marketing Program
The Agricultural Refrigerated Truck Quarterly Report (AgRTQ) provides a national and regional overview of the volume, rates and availability of U.S. refrigerated truckload movements to help identify trends and reviews relevant economic and regulatory issues to help gauge impacts on this vital component of transportation for fresh fruit and vegetable markets.
Each AgRTQ includes a feature article that focus on a specific issue or specific region. Recent examples include the 1st Quarter 2018 report describing the impacts and interrelationships of the refrigerated market for railcars and trucks and the 4th Quarter 2017 report describing the economic conditions behind the recent spike in truck rates and widespread truck shortages.
Two divisions within the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) collaborate to produce the AgRTQ. The Transportation and Marketing Program, Transportation Services Division publishes the quarterly using truck rate, shipment volume and availability data compiled from weekly Truck Rate Report issued by the Specialty Crops Program, Specialty Crops Market News Division.
Using the weekly volume and rate data, the AgRTQ creates the quarterly weighted average truck rates for nine regional markets: Arizona, California, Florida, Great Lakes (Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin), the Mexico-Arizona border, the Mexico-Texas border, New York, Pacific Northwest (Idaho, Oregon and Washington), and Southeast (North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia). Shipment volumes and specific commodities originating in these markets are reported each quarter.
Truck rates to 10 terminal markets -- Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Philadelphia and Seattle -- are also reported in terms of dollars per mile and dollars per truckload.
For the first time, the data behind the AgRTQ is available online. The online datasets contain the raw data used in creating the graphs and analysis found in the report. In addition, they contain historical data going back to 2000 and additional detail not available in the report by commodity and region for rates and volumes.
The AgRTQ is one of the many ways the Transportation Services Division tracks developments in truck, rail, barge and ocean transportation and provides information and analysis on the four major modes of moving food from farm to table and port to market.