international trade and transportation?
In the United States, multiple agencies and organizations (both public and private) are involved in the collection, processing and dissemination of international trade and transportation data. No one dataset provides all the information requirements needed by the transportation community. Data collection approaches may also vary. Some data are required by regulation and can be considered administrative data. Others are collected via surveys. Some data are reported by carriers while other data represent information from shippers. The integration of these different data sources helps to provide a more complete picture of U.S. international trade and transportation flows and trends. However, several challenges do arise when using multiple data sources, including variations in accuracy, reliability, time series, and data field definitions.
