The Commodity Flow Survey (CFS) is a joint effort by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) and the U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Commerce. The survey is the primary source of national and state-level data on domestic freight shipments by establishments in mining, manufacturing, wholesale, auxiliaries, and selected retail and services trade industries located in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Data are provided on the type, origin and destination, value, weight, modes of transportation, distance shipped, and ton-miles of commodities shipped. The CFS is conducted every 5 years as part of the economic census. It provides a modal picture of national freight flows and represents the only publicly available source of commodity flow data for the highway mode. The CFS was conducted in 1993, 1997, 2002, 2007, and most recently in 2012.

The CFS assesses the demand for transportation facilities and services, energy use, and safety risk and environmental concerns. CFS data are used by policy makers and transportation planners in various federal, state, and local agencies. Additionally, business owners, private researchers, and analysts use the CFS data for analyzing trends in the movement of goods, mapping spatial patterns of commodity and vehicle flows, forecasting demands for the movement of goods, and determining needs for associated infrastructure and equipment.

An export in the CFS is defined as shipment to a foreign country from the 50 states and Washington, DC. Shipments to U.S. possessions and territories are also treated as exports. Respondents to the CFS were asked to report the foreign city, country of destination, and mode of transport by which the shipment left the country. We also asked the respondent to report the U.S. port, airport, or border crossing of exit and report the “domestic mode” of transport used to reach the U.S. destination. Due to the exclusion of industries outside the scope of the CFS (see Industry Coverage), these data are not directly comparable to the 2012 merchandise trade exports published by the Department of Commerce.

Shipment characteristics including value, tons, and ton-miles are presented in summary form in this report. Ton-miles, which is defined as the shipment weight multiplied by the mileage traveled by the shipment, uses domestic mileage only for the calculation.