The Farm Service Agency (FSA) is the United States Department of Agriculture agency that was formed by merging the farm loan portfolio and staff of the Farmers Home Administration (FmHA) and the Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service (ASCS).

As part of their new goals, the Commodity Stabilization Service began conservation programs such as the soil bank.

The committees are responsible for hiring and supervising the County Executive Director (CED), who manages the day-to-day activities of the field service center and its employees.

74-46), are so named because they have overseen USDA field offices for farmers that once existed in most rural farm counties throughout the United States.

In the South, black farmers were not commonly elected to county committees and were discriminated against in the administration of farm programs.

A class-action lawsuit, Pigford v. Glickman, was settled in 1999 to gain compensation for African-American farmers who had been damaged by such discrimination from 1981 to 1996.

SAAs were instituted as part of the Agricultural Credit Act of 1987 (P. L. 100-233) for the purpose of avoiding foreclosure due to the drop in land prices at that time.

Report for Congress: Agriculture: A Glossary of Terms, Programs, and Laws, 2005 Edition (PDF).