Major Management Challenges and Program Risks

This publication is part of GAO's performance and accountability series which provides a comprehensive assessment of government management, particularly the management challenges and program risks confronting federal agencies. Using a "performance-based management" approach, this landmark set of reports focuses on the results of government programs--how they affect the American taxpayer--rather than on the processes of government. This approach integrates thinking about organization, product and service delivery, use of technology, and human capital practices into every decision about the results that the government hopes to achieve. The series includes an overview volume discussing governmentwide management issues and 20 individual reports on the challenges facing specific cabinet departments and independent agencies. The reports take advantage of the wealth of new information made possible by management reform legislation, including audited financial statements for major federal agencies, mandated by the Chief Financial Officers Act, and strategic and performance plans required by the Government Performance and Results Act. In a companion volume to this series, GAO also updates its high-risk list of government operations and programs that are particularly vulnerable to waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement.

GAO noted that: (1) USDA's field structure for managing farm programs is obsolete and inefficient; (2) the increasing incidence of foodborne illness has heightened concerns about the federal government's effectiveness in ensuring the safety of food; (3) this concern has resulted in the use of more scientific approaches to meat and poultry inspections; (4) however, these changes do not address the fundamental problem of having the responsibilities for food safety scattered among 12 different federal agencies, which results in inconsistent oversight, poor coordination, and the inefficient allocation of resources; (5) inefficiency and waste throughout the Forest Service's operations and organization have cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars; (6) while the Forest Service has made progress in recent years, it is still far from achieving financial accountability; (7) USDA continues to carry a high level of delinquent farm loan debt and to write off large amounts of unpaid loans held by problem borrowers; (8) millions of dollars in overpayments in the Food Stamp Program occur because eligible persons are paid too much or because ineligible individuals improperly participated in the Food Stamp Program; (9) USDA has a long-standing history of deficiencies in its accounting and financial management systems; (10) USDA has an action plan for resolving its accounting and financial systems' deficiencies that calls for full implementation by fiscal year 2000; (11) USDA is not effectively managing its telecommunications systems and services; (12) to respond to these problems, USDA has identified improvements it states could reduce its annual $200-plus million telecommunications investment by as much as $70 million each year; (13) several management weaknesses raise concerns regarding the extent to which USDA's service center information technology (IT) modernization effort, which could ultimately cost more than $3 billion, will achieve an adequate return on its investment or significantly improve customer service; (14) USDA needs to develop a concept of operations and new mission-critical business processes for providing one-stop service to better ensure the success of its IT modernization efforts; (15) while USDA has begun to address the year 2000 problem, it still faces significant challenges renovating and replacing all its mission-critical systems in time and taking the necessary steps to ensure that vital public services are not disrupted; and (16) USDA's 1998 strategic plan did not address certain management problems.