Ag drones after US policy
A Terminal case study of Chinese-made ag drone registrations in the FAA aircraft registry, set against US Census import data and US policy steps.
The registry shows what was registered, not why. Trade data fills the gap.
Heavy drone imports from China fell 76% in 2025. Chinese-made ag drone registrations followed a year later, down 40%.
The import data moved first, months before the registry did. The full study also tests whether drones arrived and sat unregistered, and whether imports shifted to other countries, against every US policy step since late 2024.
The import codes cover every heavy drone, not only ag drones, and the Census Bureau publishes with a lag. The timing is correlation, not a test of what drove it.