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Mr. Evans. I am not really competent to give you advice on that, 

 Mr. Chairman — my intuition, I think that would be a better ap- 

 proach than some, but there are probably others here today that 

 can give you a better answer than I can. 



Mr. Penny. Professor, do you have a reaction to that? 



Mr. Gashler. I have a 15-year-old daughter going to school in 

 Ivanovo. She is attending college in Russia right now. I asked her 

 what the food situation was like in the schools there? She said the 

 college she is at has adequate food. 



It is not the best tasting she says, but it is adequate, but the one 

 thing she does miss is milk. Now, if there was a way to get milk 

 there, I think it would help a lot of dairy farmers in this country 

 and not too many dairy farmers would be hurt in that country at 

 this time. 



Mr. Penny. Land O'Lakes is on our next panel. 



Mr. Stenholm. Mr. Chairman. 



Mr. Penny. Mr. Stenholm. 



Mr. Stenholm. It appears that there is one area that there is 

 a great amount of similarity between our two countries, in the 

 quality and definition of the school lunchroom program. 



Mr. Penny. I don't know of any kids that like the food, but I 

 have been to Russia and I know what she is complaining about. 

 Cooper, do you envision this AKKOR — is that the way you pro- 

 nounce it, A-K-K-0-R, as being the engine for the development of 

 a cooperative farm structure within Russia? Is that our best 



Mr. Evans. It is certainly one. I will just say to you, Mr. Chair- 

 man, that frequently the groups that we work where local AKKOR 

 groups, they form this association, they get together, they talk, 

 they lay out their goals, they ask us for assistance and we often 

 say to them, hey, you need to form a cooperative to do this, what- 

 ever it is they are thinking about doing. 



So we have developed a very close working relationship with the 

 AKKOR groups at the local level, not so close at the national level, 

 but these are key players in the evolution of the private sector, no 

 question about it. 



Mr. Penny. And how do you feel about the size of the VOCA ef- 

 fort? It is, I think, slated for about 1,700 farmers over the next 3 

 years. Given all that we would like to do, all that needs to be done, 

 are we in there with a large enough contingent to make a dif- 

 ference? Could AID and VOCA do more if we made the resource 

 available? 



Mr. Evans. Let us respond to your office in writing on that one 

 right away. 



Mr. Penny. I mean, it just seems to me that while we are in the 

 first months of an involvement, this seems to have been the type 

 of assistance that is the most well received. I don't want to overtax 

 the capacity of AID or VOCA to deliver efficiently the service, but 

 by the same token, we are talking about a huge country with 12 

 Republics and 1,700 farmers on the ground or other agricultural 

 experts on the ground is helpful in some degree, but it still leaves 

 us a long ways from where we need to go. 



Mr. Evans. Exactly. We will get you something directly. 



Mr. Penny. My last question is whether — and you may not be 

 prepared to answer this, but getting back to the Extension Service, 



