Data on purchase prices of the means of agricultural production (electricity, fuel, feedingstuffs, fertilizers, etc.) expressed in euro and national currency.

The comparability of products and means of production for which price series are recorded depends on a certain number of specific characteristics linked to the product under consideration, the procedure for recording the prices and their statistical processing. All these characteristics could have an influence on the price level of a specific product (or means of production). Hence, strict comparability between Member States would require that they should be the same for all the prices collected in individual countries.

Selling prices should be recorded at the first marketing stage ("prices from the producer to the trade") and purchase prices of the means of production at the last marketing stage ("prices from the trade to the producer").

Prices are obtained by the Member States from a wide variety of sources, like the following: - Samples to producers which make direct sales - Records of transaction as part of an administrative process - Administered prices - Enquiries to bodies purchasing or selling the agricultural products and/or inputs.

Although much progress has already been made in the harmonisation of the time series across Member States, caution must still be exercised when comparing the actual agricultural prices among Member States. Differences in the prices can still reflect methodological differences (for example different form of commercialisation of the product concerned) and not factual differences in every case in the prices themselves. Hence, the user of the data should always refer to the description of the data as provided by the target definition.

Whilst the purpose of agricultural price indices is to reveal trends in the prices of individual agricultural products or product groups, the purpose of the Statistics of Absolute Agricultural Prices is ‑ above all ‑ a dual one: they are used for (1) comparisons between Member States and (2) for economic analyses. Absolute agricultural prices (especially aggregated prices) are needed for many model calculations and for the determination of price elasticities.