The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) commodity purchases play an important role in supporting American agriculture. One commodity purchasing effort - the USDA Foods Program - purchases about 2 billion pounds of nutritious, domestically produced foods each year and supplies this food to families, schools, food banks, and communities nationwide, also serving as a key tool for combatting hunger.
Together, the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service, Food and Nutrition Service and Farm Service Agency manage the USDA Foods Program. And together, we have launched the USDA Foods Business Management Improvement project, a broad effort to review and re-engineer USDA’s food procurement practices to improve the program for our customers and stakeholders.
We’re taking steps—both big and small—to move forward using the latest technology and other means to improve the USDA Foods procurement system for our customers and stakeholders.
Earlier this month, we took a big step when representatives from all three agencies—myself included—met at the American Commodity Distribution Association (ACDA) Annual National Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, to discuss the process improvement project. ACDA membership represents all facets of the USDA Foods supply chain, including agricultural producers, food processors, and state and local agencies. Who better than these stakeholders to help us identify ways to improve our program? More than 600 attendees participated, sharing experiences, challenges, and ideas for tackling specific areas of the program, including the end-to-end procurement process, the national processing program, complaint and recall management, and national warehouse distribution.
Just after the ACDA event concluded, we met in California with producers and processors about our fruit and vegetable purchases for the National School Lunch Program (NSLP). These meetings are another example of the steps we take to learn from our stakeholders--whether they are companies interested in becoming suppliers or they already are a supplier for the NSLP.
These conversations with producers, vendors and suppliers help us better understand product challenges, including market conditions, as well as how we can improve our operations by synchronizing USDA food purchases with industry commercial operations for the benefit of all.
While we’re looking at the big picture, we aren’t losing sight of more immediate needs for continuous improvement, especially when it comes to encouraging supplier participation, supporting existing vendors, and improving our USDA Foods products.
That’s why we have our Annual Industry Meeting for Contractors and Suppliers in USDA’s Commodity Purchase Programs. This year, the meeting will be Tuesday, October 27, and Wednesday, October 28, 2015, in Arlington, Va. Pre-registration will begin this summer.
I hope interested producers, vendors and suppliers will plan to attend this important meeting. It’s an excellent opportunity to learn more about USDA’s commodity purchase program as well as network with other stakeholders.
All of these steps that we take together will help us ensure that USDA Foods continues to meet the food needs of communities across the country.
