Agriculture secretary tells employees to hit ground running on new initiatives

Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman told a group of employees in Savannah, Ga., Wednesday that the Bush administration's top agricultural priority is to work with Congress to pass a farm bill and that department officials expect them to implement it quickly.

"We have certain provisions of the various versions of the bill that have some things we know we're going to have to do," Veneman said. "So we want to be prepared when this bill reaches the president's desk, so that we can hit the ground running and get it implemented as quickly as possible. We want to do everything we can to help you do that."

Veneman said the president's fiscal 2003 budget will include $131 million in new spending to strengthen Agriculture's food safety programs. That will include $49 million for animal health monitoring and $19 million in to improve agricultural inspections at points of entry by providing additional inspectors and expanding dog teams.

Veneman said staffing at ports of entry will be increased by 55 percent over three years, to 3,974 employees. The Bush budget also will include an $11 million increase to expand technical services at the Animal, Plant and Health Inspection Service and a $28 million increase for the Food Safety and Inspection Service.

USDA is already using state-of-the-art X-ray machines on "high-risk points of entry"-such as Salt Lake City during the Olympics-and their use will be expanded, Veneman said.

The administration's budget also will include $14.5 million to improve Agriculture's information technology infrastructure and risk management systems, and $24 million to support research aimed at protecting the nation's food system from attack.

Veneman was supposed to make the speech in Kansas City, Mo., home to the largest concentration of Agriculture employees outside Washington. But an ice storm prevented her travel there, and the event was moved to Savannah. Veneman is continuing on a trip to Texas, Michigan and Ohio to talk about President Bush's budget priorities for Agriculture.