
Counting it as part of the old crop could skew reporting on the size of the following year's crop. "It's a difficult problem, and we're still working on it, and we're not happy with the end result yet," a USDA official says.
Another official adds that moving up the start of the marketing year to Aug 1 isn't feasible, as it would create the need for new reports, and an unlikely increase in the agency's budget.