1. Time scale

The calendar year (from 1 January to 31 December) have to be applied for data of the RDES, due to the difference of the crop year in each country.

2. Definitions

Definitions of data of the RDES have to be FAO definitions (Please see the FAO definitions on the FAOSTAT; http://faostat.external.fao.org). And elements of crop production data are production (metric ton; MT), area harvested (hectare; ha) and yield (kg per hectare; kg/ha).

3. Data Item and Description Code

Most data of the RDES are crop production and livestock data. Although it depends on the background of food life in each country of the Focal Points, it is appropriate to register these 19 items for the RDES as basic data items, such as Rice Paddy, Wheat, Maze, Cereals, Cassava, Potatoes, Pulses, Groundnuts, Soybean, Seed cotton, Sugar cane, Tea, Cattle, Pig, Sheep, Goat, Chicken, Milk total and Hen eggs.

While other data for food security are required by users, such as other crops and livestock, land area, population, prices, fisheries, etc. The name of the item has to accord the Description Code as follow table. All the definitions of the data items are based on the FAO definition (Please see the section 4).

List of Description code
Description code	Data		Description code	Data
A01	Total land area		G01	Jute
A02	Agricultural land		G02	Seed cotton
A03	Total population		G03	Raw silk
A04	Agricultural population		G04 - G99	Other fibre crops
A05 – A99	Other demographic data		H01	Natural rubber
B01	Rice paddy		H02	Sugar cane
B02	Wheat		H03	Coffee
B03	Maize		H04	Tea
B04	Millet (Bajra)		H05	Cocoa bean
B05	Cereals		H06	Chilies and peppers
B06	Barley		H07	Tobacco
B07	Buckwheat		H08 - H99	Other crops
B08	Sorghum (Jowar)		I01	Cattle
B09	Small millet		I02	Buffalo
B10 – B99	Other cereal crops		I03	Pig
C01	Cassava		I04	Sheep
C02	Sweet potatoes		I05	Goat
C03	Potatoes		I06	Chicken
C04	Taro		I07	Duck
C05 – C99	Other roots and tubers		I08	Milk total
D01	Pulses		I09	Cow milk
D02	Gram		I10	Buffalo milk
D03	Mungbean		I11	Hen eggs
D04	Tur		I12	Poultry
D05 – D99	Other pulses		I13	Horse
E01	Groundnuts		I14	Yak
E02	Soybean		I15 – I99	Other livestock	honey, camel
E03	Coconut		J01	Wholesale prices
E04	Palm oil		J02	Retail prices
E05	Oil crops (Oil seeds)	copra	J03 - J99	Other prices
E06	Castor seed		K01 - K99	Fisheries
E07	Linseed		L01 - L99	Forestry
E10	Rapeseed & Mustard		M01 - M99	Census data
E11	Safflower		N01 - N99	Other data
E12	Sesame
E13	Sunflower
E14 – E99	Other edible oil crops
F01	Fruits total
F02	Bananas
F03	Citrus
F04	Mangoes
F05	Vegetables total
F06	Tomatoes
F07	Onions
F08	Watermelon
F09 – F99	Other horticulture crops	apples, oranges, dates

* The parts of shade are basic data items of the RDES.

4. Data table format and File format

The focal points have to use the same format storing data in the system as shown in the following tables. And excel file was recommended as file format. Because it is easier to utilize for analysis, re-tabulation, quote and so on for users than other file formats, such as PDF file, MS-Word file, etc.

Moreover, in Excel file, it would be better to save one data table in one sheet.

Table B01-1 Rice paddy: Production
											Unit: Mt
	1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	Forecast (2003)
National Total
Province1
Province2
Province3