Safeguarding American Agriculture.

 

Delivering Services with a Customer Focus.

Today, customers expect more transparent, accessible, and responsive services from the public sector. While the public sector has made changes in recent years to improve the delivery of services, more can be done. According to a recent survey conducted by the McKinsey Center for Government, customers feel frustrated by cumbersome websites and processes, and dealing with multiple parties before their needs are met. In addition to traditional customers, the public sector must also be prepared to meet the needs of new and less traditional customers. For example, the growth of nontraditional producers in recent years has required APHIS to expand its services to cover additional species, and new production methods and practices. With this in mind, we will seek out opportunities to engage with our customers so we can better understand their needs and gather feedback on our services. This will include reaching out to underserved communities, socially disadvantaged farmers, ranchers, and tribes. We will focus on being more efficient and effective. We will base our decisions on robust and timely analysis of data to better meet the needs of our customers. For a number of APHIS programs, our customers and stakeholders may have differing viewpoints, and we value these differences. Engaging partners, stakeholders, and customers including the regulated community with differing viewpoints is important in managing the risks associated with program operations and policymaking. 

Global Demand for U.S. Agricultural Products.

Expanding international marketing opportunities for U.S. farmers and exporters is crucial to business and income growth across rural America. In fact, today the U.S. farmers export more than 20 percent of what they produce, and support more than 1 million jobs in communities across the country for ranchers, growers, truckers, brokers, dockworkers, and other agricultural businesses. APHIS contributes to this robust export market by providing technical and scientific expertise to animal and plant health issues, and by preventing and resolving barriers to U.S. food and agricultural exports. This scientific and technical know-how is vital to the success of those that negotiate, monitor, and enforce trade agreements. Without it, the task of retaining or expanding foreign markets would be more challenging than it already is, given the unpredictability of the trade arena. APHIS plays a crucial role in helping prevent or mitigate market disruptions for U.S. producers and foreign consumers.

 Ensuring Protection is at a Reasonable Cost. 

APHIS is dedicated to protecting the health, welfare, and value of American agriculture and natural resources. At the same time, APHIS understands this protection should be at a reasonable cost. With this understanding, APHIS is committed to easing regulatory burdens on the American people. Easing regulatory burdens makes it easier to create jobs and promote economic growth. Agriculture and commerce operations have changed over the years, and the regulatory tools that worked in the past may not be the best tools to use today. We need to go beyond regulations and seek out other means for safeguarding animal and plant health, and animal welfare. We will continue to work closely with our partners, stakeholder, and customers to explore alternatives to regulations. This may include employing outreach initiatives or leveraging industry standards. We will look at flexible approaches to apply to existing 4 regulations and identify older regulations that are outdated, unnecessary, ineffective, and no longer supported by science or sound policy.

 Rapid Advances in Science and Technology

 Rapid advances in science and technology provide APHIS with opportunities to continually change how we provide services to our customers. This includes adapting our current practices and adopting new best practices. Communications and commerce occur electronically—hardcopy forms are quickly becoming obsolete. Plant and animal sciences are changing quickly with developments in the areas of genetic engineering, disease detection and veterinary biologics, among others. Other developing technologies, including unmanned aerial systems (drones) are increasingly utilized by the public and private sectors to increase efficiencies in surveys and monitoring. Like USDA’s initiative to provide faster, friendlier and easier service to its customers, APHIS too is committed to making it easier and faster for customers to find the information they need. With an eye toward excellence, value, and the future, we are always finding new ways to accomplish our work so that APHIS’ way of doing business reflects the way agriculture and commerce operate today. We use more technology to ensure industry moves at the speed of commerce and keeps up with demand for agricultural commodities. Our science centers will lead the way by developing and delivering science-based knowledge and methods to identify and analyze risks and mitigate threats. Along with traditional communication tools such as publications and public service announcements, we also use new technologies to reach our partners, stakeholders, and customers. 

Changing Pest and Disease Landscape 

Today, the landscape for pests and diseases is changing. Pest and disease events are more frequent, more complex, and less predictable. These changes are occurring for many reasons, including human population growth, urbanization, economic development, changes in land use, increases in global travel and trade, and changing farming and production practices. These global developments are contributing to the worldwide redistribution of pathogens, vectors, and infected hosts. Examples of recent global emerging disease events include the Middle East respiratory syndrome outbreak in 2012, the H7N9 avian influenza outbreak in China in 2013, the Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus (PEDV) outbreak in the United States in 2014, the H5N2 avian influenza outbreak in the United States in 2015, and the Zika virus outbreak in 2016. Many of these events involve zoonotic diseases with the potential to impact human health and that requires new partnerships with experts in public health, wildlife, and the environment. It is essential that APHIS adapts to this changing landscape by preventing the entry and spread of these pests and diseases in the United States and by strengthening its early detection, preparedness, and response capabilities. APHIS will employ an integrated systems-based One Health approach, which focus on the interconnection between people, animals, plants and the environment, to minimize the risk of pest and disease events, to protect the national food supply.