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1 1 (March 11, 2020)

handle is hein.crs/govcaot0001 and id is 1 raw text is: 01;0i E~$~ & March 11, 2020 Staffing Trends in the USDA Farm Production and Conservation (FPAC) Mission Area The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) administers federal farm and conservation programs primarily through three agencies: the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), the Farm Service Agency (FSA), and the Risk Management Agency (RMA). All three agencies have experienced staffing declines over the last 20 years. Many in Congress have expressed general concern over USDA staffing levels in annual appropriations statements and oversight hearings. This report analyzes available data on NRCS, FSA, and RMA staffing levels. Issues related to total staffing levels such as funding, workload analysis, and capacity are not discussed. All staffing data in this In Focus were obtained directly from the annual President's budget explanatory notes that are published by USDA (see https://www.obpa.usda.gov/). Unless otherwise stated, only data listed as actual are included and are from the most recent year that each data point was available. This In Focus includes two types of staffing level data staff years and end-of-year staff levels. A staff year is the equivalent of one full-time person working for one year. End-of-year (EOY) staff levels are calculated based on a point in time, which in the case of USDA is the end of the fiscal year (September 30). Both staff year and EOY provide useful information about an agency's staffing levels. In 2017, USDA created the Farm Production and Conservation (FPAC) mission area as part of a larger departmental reorganization. FPAC includes NRCS, FSA, RMA, and a new FPAC Business Center. Under the new FPAC structure, certain administrative functions and personnel were further reallocated from FSA, RMA, and NRCS into the new FPAC Business Center. The Business Center is responsible for certain overarching management and technology-related operations of the three agencies. Total staffing at agencies currently in the FPAC mission area has declined by 29% from FY2004 to FY2019 (from 27,429 to 19,511; Figure 1). Hiring freezes in 2017 that continued into 2018 further reduced staffing, even as the FPAC Business Center was created and staff were shifted from the component agencies. Since the end of 2016, which was a recent high-level staffing year, FPAC mission area staffing during the current Administration has steadily declined, decreasing by nearly 12% (from 22,051 in FY2016 to 19,511 in FY2019; Figure 1). Figure I. FPAC Mission Area Staffing Permanent, Full-Time Staff Positions, EOY 20 .10\1 11 IN q n b d ad Sa er v u i 001 N 0 1 staffing in NRCS, RMA, and FSA (permanent federal staff only, since estimates for total FSA staffing were not available) is not proposed to increase through FY2021. NRCS is the primary federal agency providing agricultural conservation technical and financial assistance to private landowners. The majority (98% in FY2019) of NRCS staff are located throughout the country in state, county, and technical offices. From FY2004 to FY2018, NRCS staffing has declined by 19% (from 11,886 to 9,605; Figure 2). The FPAC realignment in FY2019 transferred about 880 staff years from NRCS to the Business Center. This was over 9% of effective NRCS staff years at the time. If the FY2020 estimate for total NRCS permanent, full-time positions is realized, it would represent a 27% decline from FY2019. This is a further reduction from the previous year's Business Center realignment. USDA intends to reverse most of this decline with additional hiring in FY2021, according to the FY2021 budget proposal. NRCS has also maintained a balance of unfilled permanent positions for the past 20 years. Unfilled positions hit a high mark from FY2012 through FY2018 when they ranged between close to 900 to over 2,500. Unfilled positions declined in FY2019 to 363 but increase six-fold in the FY2020 estimate to 2,312 (Figure 2). p\w -- , gnom goo mppm qq\ a , q 'S I 11LULANJILiN,

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