Modernizing FSA

Modernizing FSA. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. On Monday Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced that USDA has awarded a major contract to improve the delivery of agricultural services and benefits to producers by using modern, secure and reliable technology. The modernization of Farm Service Agency technology will improve customer service according to FSA Administrator Jonathan Coppess. COPPESS: While it won't fix everything it will certainly be a significant improvement on how we as an agency conduct our business and how we serve farmers and ranchers across the country through these numerous programs that tend to get more and more complex as we go. We anticipate a level of service that will be noticeably improved for farmers and ranchers and will be much easier to handle and manage for our field staff and for those of us here at the headquarters. Coppess says the first MIDAS or Modernize and Innovate the Delivery of Agricultural Systems program announcement is just one of several broad efforts to modernize the agency and improve both technology and customer service. COPPESS: The Secretary has been very forward looking as far as helping the department transform many of its most basic functions, how it operates. He has been very forward thinking on how we all communicate and work together across agencies, outside of silos that whole bit. This modernization effort is part of that but part of just an overall push to bring our service capabilities up to a 21st century level and frankly it's something you just need to do as a service organization. He explains how the first of several FSA technology and service transformations will benefits customers and office personnel. COPPESS: The end of the effort, the result of that and the outcome will certainly be seen by the farmers that come into the county offices that work with us that utilize our programs. This is also an incredible and important investment in our county office structure and our field structure and how we do business so that frankly the folks that work so hard out there in the counties and the states have a better system to work off of, have better processes to utilize, their time is better utilized, their time is not wasted on a lot of effort that doesn't need to go into it. And all of that then of course will improve what the farmer sees every time he or she comes into a county office. They want to do things online, they want to upload acreage reports online and come in and work with county staff on a complex new program you've got that ability to be a little bit more flexible for the customer and provide our field staff then with the resources to really focus on customer service and maybe a little less of the paperwork themselves so I think all side of that out in the countryside will begin to see this. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.