§8002 Implementation funding and information management

Summary

The Secretary of Agriculture may use up to $55,000,000 from the Commodity Credit Corporation to pay admin costs for putting Title I and its changes into effect. Those funds stay available until spent. From that amount, the Secretary must spend at least $5,000,000 but no more than $8,000,000 to build the information system described next. In addition to that money, Congress can approve whatever extra funds are needed to carry out the information system for each of fiscal years 2003 through 2008. The Secretary must create a single, modern information management system for programs run by the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation and the Farm Service Agency. The system must help farmers access programs, protect and speed up data collection, avoid collecting the same data twice, meet agency needs, and lower USDA costs. Current FSA and FCIC data must be combined and reformatted so both agencies can use the system. The Secretary must hire a non-Federal contractor and should prefer firms with prior FCIC experience and that worked on the ID rules in section 1515(f). Data may be shared with any federal agency that needs it and with approved insurance providers for their insured producers. The work must not delay existing FCIC or FSA data mining or warehousing contracts.