U.S. Department of Agriculture

From 1993 through 1998, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) cut its departmentwide administrative staff for four functions--human resources, budgeting, accounting and auditing, and acquisition--by 15 percent, from 10,300 to an estimated 8,800. USDA estimates that the number of administrative staff will decrease by an additional 250 by the end of fiscal year 1999. As of November 1998, USDA had not yet begun to implement its plan to consolidate and streamline administrative functions at the state office level. USDA has no plans to develop performance measures to determine the economies and efficiencies realized as a result of its departmentwide streamlining actions. Without additional performance measures, such as those that examine the quality of service delivery, USDA will not know the extent to which it has achieved greater efficiency, effectiveness, and economy in its programs and activities.

GAO noted that: (1) from fiscal year (FY) 1993 through FY 1998, USDA reduced its departmentwide administrative staff for four administrative functions--human resources, budgeting, accounting and auditing, and acquisition--from about 10,300 to an estimated 8,800, or by 15 percent; (2) USDA estimates that the number of administrative staff will decrease by an additional 250 by the end of FY 1999; (3) at that time, about 8,550 administrative staff will support approximately 98,500 program staff; (4) USDA has no estimates for further departmentwide reductions in administrative staffing beyond 1999; (5) as of November 1998, USDA had not begun to implement its plan to consolidate and streamline administrative functions at the state office level; (6) these new state offices will receive policy guidance from a newly created headquarters Support Service Bureau and report to a board of directors composed of the state leaders of the Farm Service Agency, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and Rural Development; (7) the plan, which is expected to be fully implemented by 2002, requires the completion of a number of time-consuming and potentially costly actions, including relocating offices, developing common policies and procedures, and instituting common computing systems; (8) furthermore, although it appears that administrative consolidation may provide long-term savings and efficiencies, USDA may incur additional costs to implement this consolidation in the short term; (9) USDA has no plans to develop performance measures to determine the economies and efficiencies realized as a result of its departmentwide streamlining actions; (10) USDA officials believe that a single measure--personnel reductions--serves as a sufficient indicator of the Department's overall performance; and (11) however, without additional performance measures, such as those that measure the quality of service delivery, USDA will not know the extent to which it has accomplished the 1994 act's overall objective of achieving greater efficiency, effectiveness, and economy in the organization and management of its programs and activities.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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