Summary: A review of the meat industry revealed that shortcomings in the Department of Agriculture's (USDA) paperwork management program allowed for the: (1) preparing of meaningless burden estimates; and (2) collecting of unneeded, unused, and duplicate information from the meat industry. One key to resolving the problems is the availability of reliable information regarding the paperwork burden imposed. Such information is generally not available at USDA. Thus the USDA burden data usually represents unsupported staff judgment. Another aspect of effective paperwork management involves practical utility reviews, or studies designed to determine if collected information is actually used. The USDA lack of procedures for conducting such reviews has resulted in inconsistencies among its agencies in determining need and use. Therefore, information has been collected which USDA does not use and sometimes discards. A third aspect of effective paperwork management involves the USDA methods for controlling duplicate reporting and redtape. The methods do not work. In an effort to eliminate duplicate reporting, USDA has scheduled a review of all the regulations and reporting requirements. The GAO reviews of the paperwork burden imposed by the federal government are among several government-wide efforts currently underway to improve federal paperwork management programs. GAO believes that the President's actions in Executive Order 12174 have great potential for improving federal paperwork management. However, legislation is required to bring all agencies under a strong central management authority. Legislation which has been proposed with this objective in mind, is needed to solve the kinds of problems discussed here.
