Summary

The Department of Agriculture's (USDA) decennial Nationwide Food Consumption Survey is an important tool in evaluating the nutritional status of Americans. Government, academia, and industry all depend on the survey for key information. The most recent survey, in 1987-88, was planned and supervised by USDA's Human Nutrition Information Service and was carried out by a contractor. Referring to the findings of an earlier report (GAO/RCED-91-117, July 26, 1991), GAO testified that the survey was seriously flawed. Methodological problems, deviations from the survey's original design, and lax controls over the collection and processing of the survey data all raise doubts about the quality and the usefulness of the survey's results. In addition, USDA's poor handling of the contract contributed to cost overruns, a two-year delay in completing the survey, and the contractor's failure to complete important contract tasks.