Background Memo  

The PublicMind poll was sponsored by the New Jersey Farm Bureau and was conducted by telephone from October 23 through October 28 using a randomly selected sample of 801 registered voters statewide aged 18 and over.  The sampling error for 801 adults is +/- 3.5 percentage points at the 95 percent level of confidence. Survey results are also subject to non-sampling error. This kind of error, which cannot be measured, arises from a number of factors including, but not limited to, non-response (eligible individuals refusing to be interviewed), question wording, the order in which questions are asked, and variations among interviewers. All PublicMind interviews are conducted by TMR, Inc. of Cedar Knolls, NJ.  Professionally trained interviewers use a CATI (Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing) system. Random selection is achieved through computerized random-digit dialing. This technique gives every person with a phone number (including those with unlisted numbers) an equal chance of being selected.

The questions included in this release are as follows:

Question: By the way, to the best of your knowledge, why is New Jersey called the Garden State?

• Farming
• Gardening/flowers
• Other

Question: How much confidence do you have in the safety of locally-grown, Jersey Fresh produce?

• A lot
• Some
• Just a little
• None at all

Question: How important is it--to you personally--to have farming and farmland preservation in New Jersey?

• Very Important
• Somewhat Important
• Not Very Important
• Not Important at All

Question:  Last year, in order to save money in the budget, the governor proposed eliminating New Jersey's Department of Agriculture. Do you think that was a good or bad idea?

Question: Now let me ask about farming and solar panels.  Should the state of New Jersey encourage or not encourage farmers to use their farmland to put up acres of pole-mounted solar panels to harvest sunlight in order to sell electric power?

see also:
Survey Analysis
Tabular Results