FAS Is Reconstituted
On March 10, 1953, Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson abolished OFAR and reconstituted the Foreign Agricultural Service. In April 1954 FAS handed off national security-related technical assistance to the International Cooperation Administration (forerunner of USAID) and began to concentrate on foreign market development for U.S. agricultural commodities, signaling a radical shift in the agency's focus. On September 1, 1954, following passage of H.R. 8033 (P.L. 83-690), the agricultural attachés were transferred back from State Department to FAS.
In the same year, Congress passed Public Law 480 (P.L. 83-480), the Food for Peace Act, which became the backbone of FAS's food aid and market development efforts. Agricultural attachés began negotiating agreements for concessional sale of U.S. farm commodities to foreign countries on terms of up to 30 years and in their own local currencies.
In 1955 FAS began signing cooperative agreements with groups representing American producers of specific commodities in order to expand foreign demand. The first such agreement was signed with the National Cotton Council. This activity came to be called the Market Development Cooperator Program, and the groups themselves to be called "cooperators".
In 1961 the General Sales Manager of USDA's Commodity Stabilization Service (CSS) and his staff were merged into FAS, bringing with them operational responsibility for export credit and food aid programs. In particular, the General Sales Manager was responsible for setting prices for export sale of USDA-owned surplus commodities that had been acquired through domestic farm support programs. At the same time, the CSS Barter and Stockpiling Manager was also moved to FAS. In the post-WWII era, USDA's Commodity Credit Corporation was heavily involved in efforts to barter CCC-owned commodities acquired via domestic farm support programs for strategic commodities available from foreign countries short of hard currency. By the mid-1960s as European and Asian economies recovered from the war, however, the emphasis on barter waned.
In 1969 the General Sales Manager and his staff were split off to form a separate USDA agency, the Export Marketing Service (EMS). In 1974, however, EMS was re-merged with FAS. In 1977, under pressure from the Congress, the Carter Administration created an "Office of the General Sales Manager" nominally headed by the General Sales Manager, but in reality still a subunit of FAS and subordinate to the FAS Administrator. In 1981 the Ronald Reagan Administration abolished the Office of the General Sales Manager and formally restored its status as a program area of FAS. During that time, the GSM's responsibilities expanded from mere disposition of surplus commodities to management of commodity export credit guarantee programs, foreign food assistance programs, and direct credit programs.
The Foreign Agricultural Service, a foreign affairs agency since 1930, was included in the Foreign Service Act of 1980. Agricultural attachés were offered the choice of remaining civil servants or being grandfathered into the Foreign Service. Since that time the vast majority of agricultural officers overseas, just like State Department officials overseas, have been Foreign Service Officers. Since 1939, 11 former agricultural attachés have been confirmed as American Ambassadors.
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