41 



I also think that as farming becomes more technical all the time, 

 farmers can come into these centers and be brought up to date on 

 ideas. Also, if they're looking to move into other areas of farming, 

 they can get engineering education which can help them develop 

 alternative crops. This is an area that is just waiting for some cre- 

 ative money to be put into it. USDA can do it. I think we can see a 

 great benefit for rural America in helping people feel that they 

 have many options and opportunities to improve their circum- 

 stances. 



Second, are you going to give the Inspector General in USDA tar- 

 gets on areas of savings that can be made in such things as travel 

 and moving expenses? These budget items can be quite large 

 within the agency's budget but often get overlooked from up here. I 

 hope you do that. 



One other thing. The Department of Natural Resources in our 

 State has come down on concentrated animal facilities with the 

 possible requirement of putting in test wells. I would just like to 

 compliment the Soil Conservation Service for having stepped for- 

 ward quickly and worked with farmers to come up with artificial 

 wetlands as a much less expensive and practical way to get at 

 water pollution problems and head off this financial trouble that 

 the Department of Natural Resources had proposed with these test 

 wells, which as you know are after the fact testing of a problem 

 that we want to be heading off in a practical cost-efficient way 

 before it even comes up. SCS has done a good job there. 



Thank you very much. 



Secretary Espy. Those are three good questions and three good 

 statements. 



If I could respond quickly to at least two of them, when it comes 

 to restructuring and cost savings and those types of things, of 

 course the Inspector General will be involved and the recommenda- 

 tions of that office will be taken very seriously. There are some 

 clear targets. If you have been over there even the briefest of 

 times, you can see very quickly that they have a lot of different 

 divisions. Each division has a press secretary and a press office. 

 There are at least 55 or 56 press officials over there. 



When it comes to lawyers, each division has a bank of lawyers. 

 There are probably 150 or 160 lawyers over there. 



Personnel offices. Each division has its own personnel office. 



I hope that these are some areas that we can consider for consoli- 

 dation first. We can see some cost savings immediately and in the 

 near future. We should operate down the line by function and 

 maybe consolidate these areas. 



Also when it comes to economic development in the rural areas, 

 in my confirmation proceedings I was impressed with a Senator 

 who told me how much the Prodigy software costs to use in an 

 urban area of a State and how much more it costs in a rural area 

 of a State that was about 12 miles away because the infrastructure 

 is not there. The computer capability is not there. The telephone 

 lines are not there. 



It doesn't take a genius to see that because of the economies of 

 scale and because these areas are less dense, they have suffered 

 from not having the same kind of technology of the future that the 

 urban areas have. 



