At present, the Farm Structure Surveys are legislated through Regulation 1166/2008 of the European Parliament.
While the individual methodology of the Farm Structure Survey varies country to country, the focus is on observing each individual “agricultural holding” and their characteristics, including land, livestock, and labour force characteristics as well as rural development measures.
Like other censuses of agriculture, the information observed through the Farm Structure Surveys are protected by confidentiality in both limiting local parameters and aggregation of the reported data.
The SGM provides a measure of a holding's business size, irrespective of its area and intensity of production.
SGMs are representative of the level of profit that could be expected on the average farm under "normal" conditions (i.e. no disease outbreaks or adverse weather).