Vilsack on Continuing Resolution cuts to USDA
Farm and Ranch April 15, 2011 USDA officials have been meeting this week to figure out how they are going to deal with the spending reductions for the department contained in that Continuing Resolution Congress has passed to fund the federal government for the rest of the 2011 fiscal year. Vilsack: “These numbers by the way are in addition to the cuts that have already been announced. So, we are talking about almost four billion dollars of cuts.” Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack addressing reporters this week and saying it is going to be a big challenge. Vilsack: “We will meet that challenge because we have to. And we will meet in the best way we can to provide the services that are important to people, but in terms of how of specifically we are going to manage it, I don’t know that.” Conservation is one area that gets cut with spending for the EQIP program reduced 80 million dollars from the 2010 authorized level. The Conservation Stewardship program gets trimmed by 39 million from that level. The Natural Resources Conservation Service has its spending reduced 118 million from 2010. In research, the National Institute on Food and Agriculture and the Agricultural Research Service are cut seven percent from last year. That is the result of elimination all earmarks as well as other programmatic changes. The Continuing Resolution also rescinds 230 million dollars in unobligated funding in the ARS Buildings and Facilities Account. I’m Bob Hoff and that’s the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on Northwest Aginfo Net. ?
