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Abstract
The United States Department of Agriculture is cooperating in an interagency study to
plan for the future development and control of the water resources of the Potomac River
Basin.' One assignment undertaken by the Farm Economics Research Division, Agricultural
Research Service, is that of appraising both the agricultural damages from floods,
and the benefits from alternative combinations of control structures on the main stem and
the major tributaries of the Potomac River. Techniques were developed for using sample
cross-sectional data and airphoto interpretation, rather than the conventional detailed
field surveys, to help us measure agricultural damage from floods. This paper discusses
the development of these techniques and indicates how they may be applied to flood-damage
studies in other areas.