§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 administrative costs for putting Title I and its changes into practice. Those funds will stay available until they are spent. At least $5,000,000 but no more than $8,000,000 of that money must be set aside for building an information system. The Secretary must create a single information management system for the Farm Service Agency and the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation. The system must make it easier for farmers to use programs, protect and timely collect data, meet agency needs, cut duplicate data requests, and lower overall data costs, plus any other needed goals. Current agency data must be combined, checked, and reformatted to work in the new system. The Secretary must hire a non-federal contractor to help and should prefer firms with past work on the Corporation’s systems and on the identification procedures in section 1515(f). Data may be shared with any federal agency that needs it and with approved insurance providers for their insured producers. Building this system must not delay existing data-mining or data-warehousing work. In addition to the set-aside, money may be appropriated as needed to carry out this system for fiscal years 2003 through 2008.