This paper reports the results of a survey of agricultural lending policies of New York State commercial banks. It focuses on the identification and quantification of bank lending policy. Analysis of the relationship between bank goals and lending policy variables and the impact of policy on bank loan volume will be provided in later reports. Lending policy is defined for this study as established guidelines that provide creditors information to assist them in determining their competitive relationship with respect to other lenders, and in turn, help them to develop more effective strategic and tactical plans for future agricultural lending. The remainder of this paper is divided into three sections: (l) survey methodology, (2) survey results, and (3) summary and conclusions. The section on survey methodology describes the development of the survey questionnaire, selection of the sample and conduct of the survey. The survey results section describes the characteristics of the responding banks and then reports on the lending policies of the banks under the general headings of: (1) Staffing and the Loan Referral Process (2) Terms of Credit (3) Loan Analysis (4) Advertising and Promotion of Agricultural Loans (5) Risk, Profitability and Lending Goals The summary and conclusions identify the major findings of the survey.