By Missy Ryan
WASHINGTON, June 18 (Reuters) - A top senator is proposing a modest step to improve the efficiency of food aid donations from the United States, the world's biggest provider of food aid, but the plan falls short of the Bush administration's vision for reform.
Sen. Tom Harkin, chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, has put forward a plan that would spend $100 million over four years on pilot projects to vet aid donations that use crops purchased in developing countries, rather than U.S. commodities that can take months to reach beneficiaries.
"The goal is to help us respond more quickly to dire humanitarian emergencies," said Harkin, an Iowa Democrat who believes close monitoring of pilot projects would allow the United States to "move cautiously" in reforming an aid scheme widely seen as needing improvement.
Harkin's plan, a copy of which was obtained by Reuters on Monday, could become part of the Senate's draft of the 2007 farm bill, which will set U.S. agriculture, food aid, and nutrition policy for five years.
The Agriculture Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development, which manages emergency food aid, are pressing Congress to free up to a quarter of emergency food aid funding, up to $300 million a year, from a requirement that U.S. crops be used. Instead, it would allow those funds to buy crops closer to famine areas, either in those very countries suffering from famine or from countries close by.
Advocates believe that is one change that could turn around U.S. food aid's record of sluggish and inefficient delivery. Earlier this year, the Government Accountability Office said millions of people were going unfed due chiefly to stringent purchase and transport rules that often benefit U.S. farmers and shipping companies.
Food aid accounts for only a tiny share of U.S. farm sales and spending. Nevertheless, Harkin's plan could encounter staunch opposition from farm groups who say U.S. tax dollars should buy American crops, not foreign-grown goods.
Some private voluntary organizations, which sell U.S.-donated crops overseas to finance development projects, have also lined up against big changes to U.S. aid. Other aid groups support change..
Harkin's vision would not draw money from current food aid funding, but would establish a separate pot for pilots.
It would fund projects, many in Africa, to purchase crops overseas to help populations hit by natural disasters, drought, famine, violent conflict or other emergencies.
All projects would be wrapped up by September 2011 to give Congress time to assess them before the next farm bill.
It would also require oversight to ensure that crop purchases do not end up hurting local economies by squeezing out small producers or run into opposition from local governments.
"It is important that we act cautiously, learn from the experience of other nations and better evaluate the Administration's proposed local purchase," Harkin said.
((Reporting by Missy Ryan, editing by Matthew Lewis; Reuters Messaging: missy.ryan.reuters.com@reuters.net; + 202-898-8376))
