government, and aid person or a usda person? you talked about a lot of different things but i don't get a context for how it is all put together. >> the answer to your first question is soon. [laughter] the answer to your second question is, there is a division of personnel. we think is important to the people in the field so the majority of our workers, usda folks are in the field, paired up with afghans and working on a variety of issues, some of which i have already mentioned. we have folks were working in the capital, who are working closely with the agriculture ministry, and pairing up in the categories that we are focused on, agricultural productivity, regenerating agribusiness, natural resources enhancement and working on the change management. that structure seems to be working well and seems to suggest the partnership we are trying to create an understanding this has to be afghan lead. we will. partnership obviously with usaid. we are looking to ambassador holbrooke for the leadership interaction. we see ourselves as a

>> one real critical thing will be the usda final production numbers january 12. that's a tuesday morning. they're going to have in there -- we might see a surprise on increase in corn yields. on the flip side of that, there's a real concern about test weights rand quality. so, the uncertainty at this point with corn supply side is a real issue. the demand side there's a real concern of lowlife stock numbers and -- low live stock numbers, poor feeding margin. need to go meet usda projection even though last couple weeks they've been good. ethanol margins have been good. they started to vip slip a week or two ago but started to come back this past week. the demand side of the corn equation is a concern. the supply side there's tremendous uncertainty especially with test weight issue. >> so, supply even though it may be there, it might -- might not be at the type of quality at this point in time. i just want to hear you say you think that's the deal. >> typically historically, this is bearish. what's going to happen is you'll have maybe two billion bushels that no o

we issued an edict, don't identify yourself as usaid or usda. the model is one team, one mission, and there's a senior ag person and although he is either usda or aid, don't actually no which one it is, and i don't actually care. and they all report, in turn to our new senior director of operations, ambassador tony rains. so we are experimenting with in a sense pioneering new structures. the a.i.d. director reports to ambassador wayne, and the ag sector bigging integrated, reports directly to aid. not through thecry. when i went to vietnam a long time ago, they were always separated and there was often a lot of friction, and we're trying to break that down. it's one of our major bureaucratic goals. >> the only thing i would like to add -- i trade to speak about this morning, and secretary clinton mentioned this in her people. you have to focus your area of change and improvement, hence the focus on agriculture. the secondes approaching the work of government approach deeply coordinated against the common strategy so the work done on the ground t

beside them is a usda official who knows a lot about agriculture but mostly knows about united statesriculture. and less about the overseas agriculture. not as much as the professional who has been doing this their whole life. the third person is a national guards person who is part of the agricultural business development teams. they are soldiers by definition, mostly farmers who have committed themselves to helping. the challenge is that this is driving around afghanistan, trying to meet the needs of the afghan agriculture. there is never enough time or money. so when this pulls up into a village, the professional is wanting to go talk to the poor people and is wanting to find out what they really need. she comes back when she hears, we can do some basic things, some test control and maintenance. we can do some extension work. this will be seasonal and this will take several years to really begin. this will not be measured by what we do for them, but what we can convince them to do for themselves. we may start to see agricultural production increase. the people in the front of the c

make a difference in their lives all those that service and by bringing these key partners, the pga, usda, and all these key partners to bear what we're doing is changing lives, working with the v.a., d.o.d. and so many people to give these individuals out on the golf course to do the things they can be inspired to do. and how great it is because mental health recovery is possible because we are able to provide this access to them. in my time has been cut short today. but i can tell you this much, our service members have given so much. you are here to provide the support to them. and it was interesting because i must tell you when i was at the brooke army medical center it was general peter pace, former joint chiefs, who was my inspiration at moments of time when i was so dark in that hospital room. and i always remember what he said to us. he said, speaking families remember on that day you didn't lose your leg, on that they sacrifice it for your country and for everyone in this nation to be afraid. today we are here to make sure that weather service members come back that we don't leav

is that an indication that we will see other steps by epa, by usda, to avoid a showdown with senate democratsngs to make, to sweeten the pot or to lessen the threat to their states' economies? >> the short answer is, i hope so. this was a very tough issue at the end of the house debate over crime legislation, when the agriculture committee demanded a set of concessions, making it more likely that money for offsets would flow into the agriculture industry and that issue has continued to be very difficult in the senate. i thought it was very encouraging that secretary vilsack and administrator jackson are collaborating on this and that they are focusing by the way on this same reforestation opportunity as a major place to produce offsets. any legislation that passes in the u.s. will create a demand for billions of tons@ @ @ @ @ @b were planning to pay brazil to slow deforestation and to take credit for that in order not to have to make reductions in your emissions from burning coal in the u.s., are you now prohibited from doing that because if brazil was going to reduce deforestation is part of

state, usda and treasury will be the big parts of it. there was a piece out of energy, that secretary chu will lead on, so there's going to be a whole government effort, but the bulk of the work will come through us. >> i was very encouraged to hear you refer to the advanced mrkt commitment, the idea of spending money at home that can help people abroad. on mitigation and adaptation, i hope usaid and policy people there will take the position that 90%, maybe even 100% of the investments are development investments. we have an excellent paper by my colleague, david wheeler, that points out that looking back at how resilient countries are to floods and disasters, the single most effective investment has been girls' education. i have several other distinguished board members here, i want to see if they -- mark brown -- former board members, do any of you want to take the floor? mark? mark, introduce yourself, i think everybody knows. >> i'm a board member of c.t.d. >> to be able to say on behalf of non-americans in this room, i think your m

there are at least nine programs at the usda, tasked with researching and developing biofuels costingxpayers nearly $300 million annually and over $800 million was included in the stimulus bill for these initiatives. the federal government oversees 15 different preservation programs costing taxpayers nearly $100 million annually. there are at least 28 federal programs totaling ove over $5 billion that support job training and employment. so here we are with an outstanding public debt that's well over $12.3 trillion. the estimate for this year is the largest in history. the estimated population of the united states is over 307.6 million people. therefore, each u.s. citizen's share of this debt is approximately $140,000. that's $40,000 for every man, woman and child in this country. that is shameful. it is shameful spending that has laid this debt on future generations of americans. the greatness of america is based on the tradition that one generation has passed off to the next generation, a nations that better off than the one that they inherited. what kind of a nation are we going to

is that an indication we will see other steps by the epa, by the usda to avoid a showdown with senatedemocrats and do things to sweeten the pot or lessen the threat to their states' economies? >> the short answer is i hope so. this was a very tough issue at the end of the house debate over climate legislation in the agriculture committee demanded a set of concessions making it more likely that money for offsets would flow into the agricultural industry and that issue has continued to be very difficult in the senate. i thought it was very encouraging secretary vilsack and administrator jackson are collaborating on this and that they are focusing by the way on this same reforestation opportunity as a major place to produce offsets. any legislation that passes in the u.s. will create a demand for billions of tons of carbon offsets and most analysts to think that it will be difficult to meet all of that demand domestically and some of it will have to be met internationally. yes? >> that is a perfect lead to my question. i'm chris hall leak from energy daily. i wonder what the impact of br

state, usda and treasury will be the big parts of it. there was a piece out of energy, that secretary chu will lead on, so there's going to be a whole government effort, but the bulk of the work will come through us. >> i was very encouraged to hear you refer to the advanced mrkt commitment, the idea of spending money at home that can help people abroad. on mitigation and adaptation, i hope usaid and policy people there will take the position that 90%, maybe even 100% of the investments are development investments. we have an excellent paper by my colleague, david wheeler, that points out that looking back at how resilient countries are to floods and disasters, the single most effective investment has been girls' education. i have several other distinguished board members here, i want to see if they -- mark brown -- former board members, do any of you want to take the floor? mark? mark, introduce yourself, i think everybody knows. >> i'm a board member of c.t.d. >> to be able to say on behalf of non-americans in this room, i think your m