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attache time is spent on agriculture reporting. However, much of 

 it is of limited value. Therefore, existing attache resources 

 could be shifted from reporting tasks to more proactive market 

 development activities which could contribute more to increasing 

 U.S. agricultural exports. 



3 ^ 



IN YOUR OPINION, WHAT IS THE MOST EFFICIENT AND EFFECTIVE WAY TO 

 INCREASE U.S. AGRICULTURAL EXPORTS? WHICH OF THE FAS PROGRAMS 

 WORK BEST? 



The best way to increase U.S. agricultural exports is to have a 

 competitive agricultural sector committed to the international 

 market. Such an industry will be positioned to export to 

 promising markets and take the greatest advantage from any trade 

 policy initiatives that reduce foreign barriers to U.S. exports. 



An agriculture program that has a market orientation at its core 

 — rather than a program that is production oriented -- will 

 enhance the international competitiveness of the U.S. agriculture 

 sector and support increased U.S. agricultural exports. Such a 

 program would be centered around the linking of agricultural 

 production to existing markets. This differs from the current 

 approach which focuses on production first, and then attempts to 

 find markets after the fact for surplus production. 



Within the context of a market oriented agriculture program, FAS 

 assistance to exporters would still be needed. However, the 

 nature of some of the assistance might change. For example, 

 timely, high quality trade leads and customer focused market 

 intelligence would take on greater importance. 



However, short of a radical change in the orientation of U.S. 

 agriculture programs, USDA export programs can be more effective 

 and efficient if they embody certain design features. These 

 include: 1) program elements to promote additionality, i.e., 

 ensuring that government assistance results in promotional 

 activity that would not take place in the absence of government 

 funding; 2) a graduation requirement, which would phase-out 

 government assistance to program beneficiaries after a fixed time 

 period; 3) that government export assistance is provided to 

 competitive private sector participants, who otherwise would be 

 unable to start exporting because of the risk, complexity, or 

 difficulty in securing resources to cover start up costs; 4) 

 provision of monetary assistance on a success conditional basis 

 so that successful exporters who have benefitted from government 

 subventions could help finance a revolving export assistance 

 fund; and 5) that USDA establish a rigorous program evaluation 

 effort to measure program effectiveness and to help guide future 

 program development. 



