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the Foreign Agricultural Service. The council is a private nonprofit 

 market development organization that represents the international 

 market interest of the U.S. producers of com, sorghum, barley, and 

 their by-products, as well as over 70 related agribusinesses. 



Our mission is to build profitability for the U.S. feed grains in- 

 dustry through the development and servicing of export markets. 

 As a cooperator with FAS for over 30 years, we have enjoyed a 

 strong working relationship. 



I am going to highlight only a few areas of our written testimony 

 which has been submitted. 



We believe the fundamental question when examining FAS oper- 

 ations should be, does this program contribute to the profitability 

 of U.S. agriculture through the development and servicing of export 

 markets? FAS programs that contribute to increased profitability 

 should be strengthened while those that do not should be restruc- 

 tured or discontinued. 



I would also like to comment on the name of the new organiza- 

 tion that has been proposed. We strongly recommend that if the 

 name of FAS has to be changed, and we don't believe that it should 

 be because of that name recognition, that any new name should 

 contain the word "agriculture." In the consolidation of FAS and 

 OICD, we believe that will strengthen the overseas mission of both 

 organizations. 



But I would like to note that specific questions were raised ear- 

 lier in the meeting today about agencies operating at cross pur- 

 poses. I would specifically like to bring to the attention of the com- 

 mittees that included in any review of agricultural development 

 programs should be the Agency for International Development or 

 AID. There have been countless instances where AID agricultural 

 programs have been counter to U.S. agricultural interests. 



Many of those programs have operated in a vacuum and have ig- 

 nored other Agencies' objectives of increasing agricultural exports 

 and eliminating trade barriers. I have cited specific examples in my 

 written testimony. 



With regard to FAS programs, the overseas offices and the as- 

 sistance of the Agricultursd counselors and attaches are certainly 

 critical to the council and the agricultural industry. The reporting 

 component of FAS provides much needed worldwide supply and de- 

 mand information and it is this information, and related trade 

 leads, that help us target and develop new markets, as well as 

 maintain feed grain exports. 



The philosophy of the cooperator program was to bring together 

 the resources of the private and public sector to develop markets 

 for U.S. agricultural products. However, for the past 5 to 8 years, 

 this program has become adversarial, rather than cooperative. The 

 change can almost be directly attributed to the General Accounting 

 Office audits requested by Congress. 



In the 40 years of the cooperator program, there has never been 

 a major audit finding against a cooperator or FAS for the mis- 

 management of funds. However, because of the mistrust created by 

 the GAO audits, we are both forced to significantly increase ex- 

 penditures to audit the program. And the money spent on those au- 

 dits and increased recordkeeping mean funds are not available for 

 export expansion activities. 



