This Secretarial natural disaster designation allows the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Farm Service Agency (FSA) to extend much-needed emergency credit to producers recovering from natural disasters through emergency loans. Emergency loans can be used to meet various recovery needs including the replacement of essential items such as equipment or livestock, reorganization of a farming operation, or to refinance certain debts.
Read MoreNutrition assistance benefits for low-income women and their children would cease, farmers won't have access to government loans and tens of thousands of USDA staff won't get paid.
Those are the top-line impacts rural communities can expect to experience if Congress fails to pass legislation required to keep the federal government operational before a Sept. 30 deadline, according to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack.
Read MoreCongresswoman Julia Letlow (LA-05) announced the introduction of H.R. 5691, the Drought Assistance Improvement Act. This bill will amend the Livestock Forage Disaster Program (LFP) and improve the Emergency Assistance for Livestock, Honey Bees, and Farm-Raised Fish Program (ELAP).
As it currently stands, the Livestock Forage Disaster Program requires cattle producers to be at a level of Severe Drought (D2) for eight consecutive weeks to qualify for one month of disaster relief.
Read MoreThe U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced that it will begin issuing more than $1.75 billion in emergency relief payments to eligible farmers and livestock producers. These much-needed payments are helping farming and ranching operations recover following natural disasters in 2020, 2021 and 2022.
Read MoreLouisiana rice farmers will get a little extra help from the federal government this year.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has announced that rice producers will receive an additional payment through the Farm Service Agency’s Rice Production Program, which provides up to $250 million in assistance to rice farmers.
Read MoreFriday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farm Service Agency announced that final payments for rice farmers through the Rice Production Program (RPP) payment will soon be made.
The RPP is $250 million in assistance specifically for U.S. rice farmers who in 2022 experienced stagnant rice market prices and record high input costs. The funding was provided for in the 2023 Consolidated Appropriations Act at the request of USA Rice.
Read MoreThe U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) recent expansion of its hurricane crop insurance policy to cover tropical storms this year has already provided farmers with $85.4 million to help them recover from Hurricane Idalia. USDA’s Risk Management Agency (RMA) rolled out the new Tropical Storm Option for its Hurricane Insurance Protection-Wind Index (HIP-WI) Endorsement earlier this year after working directly with farmers to improve coverage.
Read MoreThe U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) today announced sugar loan rates for crop year 2023 (fiscal year 2024).
USDA offers commodity loans to processors of sugar beets and domestically grown sugarcane to provide interim financing to producers so that sugar can be stored after harvest when market prices are typically low and then sold later when price conditions are more favorable.
Read MoreThe current U.S. cotton production forecast is 13.13 million bales. The forecast is expressed in standard 480-pound bale equivalents (or statistical bales). Actual physical bales (or running bales) tend to weigh closer to 500 pounds, so analysts typically use conversion factors following USDA, e.g., 1.0275 statistical bales for every running bale.
Read MoreAs Congress careens toward a possible budget stalemate and government shutdown, a bipartisan group of lawmakers from California has agreed on something – a disaster relief bill for farmers.
Read MoreU.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona and U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Thomas Vilsack sent letters to 16 governors emphasizing the over $12 billion disparity in funding between land-grant Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and their non-HBCU land-grant peers in their states.
There are HBCU land-grant institutions in 18 states; however, Delaware and Ohio have equitably funded their respective universities.
Read MoreThe Community Food Project Competitive Grants Program is intended to bring together stakeholders from distinct parts of the food system and to foster understanding of national food security trends and how they might improve local food systems. Understanding that low-income individuals experience disproportionate access to healthy foods, projects are intended to address food and nutrition insecurity, particularly among our nation’s most vulnerable populations.
Read MoreU.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack declared 11 Louisiana parishes as primary natural disaster areas due to drought. Vilsack informed Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards of the declarations in a letter dated September 6, 2023.
Read MoreAccording to the National Agricultural Statistics Service in Louisiana, there were 5.6 days suitable for fieldwork for the week ending Sunday, September 10, 2023. Topsoil moisture supplies were 45 percent very short, 36 percent short, 19 percent adequate, and 0 percent surplus.
Read MoreLouisiana corn for grain production is forecast at 119 million bushels, up 25 percent from the August 1 forecast and up 61 percent from 2022. Based on conditions as of September 1, yield is expected to average 175 bushels per acre, up 6 bushels from last month and up 5 bushels from last year. Planted acreage is revised to 700,000 acres, up 120,000 acres from June 2023. Harvested acreage for grain is revised from 565,000 to 680,000 acres.
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