USDA recently announced plans to strengthen the farm economy and provide new support for producers.
The agriculture department first teased support in a Sept. 21 news release announcing a new case of New World screwworm in Mexico. “USDA will soon release a significant plan to help rebuild the American cattle supply, incentivizing our great ranchers, and driving a full-scale revitalization of the American beef industry,” the department had said in its press release.
On Sept. 25, at the Agriculture Outlook Forum in Kansas City, MO, USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins spoke on the current state of the farm economy and the department’s plans to help support farmers and ranchers.
“My friends, we know that agriculture in our country today is under threat,” Rollins said. “You all know it because you live it more than anyone else in the country, and you deserve to know what your government plans to do about it.”
Rollins outlined a five-point plan intending to support American producers, which includes:
• Dispersing emergency relief.
• Reducing input costs.
• Expanding market access.
• Investing in international food assistance.
• Securing and protecting U.S. farmland.
USDA plans
First, Rollins noted the release of relief through the Emergency Commodity Assistance Program (ECAP), which has resulted in over $8 billion in payments to more than 560,000 farmers since March. Rollins announced the release of $2 billion in remaining funding while at the ag forum. However, in its Sept. 30 Lapse of Funding Plan, USDA noted that remaining supplemental disaster assistance program payments would cease during the government shutdown. It is unclear whether the payments were made before the lapse in government operations.
Next, Rollins focused on farmer input costs. “As I was traveling around the country, I heard a lot about fertilizer, seed, labor, interest rates, tractors … how it had all gone sky-high,” she said.
Rollins continued that she was concerned about foreign influence, especially given that much of fertilizer production takes place overseas. To address why input costs are higher, the USDA and Department of Justice (DOJ) signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Sept. 26 to protect competition in ag inputs.
“This partnership strengthens longstanding coordination between the agencies with a particular focus on ensuring coordination with respect to ensuring farmers and ranchers have competitive access to agricultural inputs,” the agencies said in a news release.
Rollins said the antitrust division of DOJ will work with USDA effective immediately to take a hard look at and scrutinize competitive conditions in the ag marketplace, including antitrust enforcement to promote free market competition. More information on their partnership is set to be released later.
Rollins also reiterated the Trump administration’s earlier announced plan of kickstarting the planned America First Trade Promotion Program a year earlier than intended. An allocation of $285 million was repurposed from the Biden administration into the program to help American agriculture expand to overseas markets.
USDA will also invest $480 million to purchase commodities from American farmers for international food assistance programs, including McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition and Food for Progress.
“Along with our federal partners, we continue to explore all viable pathways to fuel airplanes, ships, and long-haul trucks with American-grown and -produced biofuels while exploring other new uses for American-grown commodities,” Rollins said.
Rollins called the initiative a “win-win for the global market, and most importantly, a big win for our farmers and producers here at home.”
USDA is providing $240 million to purchase U.S. commodities for six McGovern-Dole projects, totaling more than 56,000 metric tons of U.S.-grown food, the department said. Partners with Food for Progress will receive $240 million to sell 361,000 metric tons of U.S. commodities abroad.
Finally, Rollins said the last prong of USDA support would be securing and protecting U.S. farmland for U.S. farmers. “USDA is working across the Trump administration to take aggressive action to address the U.S.-owned farmland by foreign adversaries and foreign ownership head-on,” she said.
USDA will no longer incentivize the development of farmland for green energy and will not use taxpayer funds to purchase solar panels, the department had announced earlier this summer.
Rollins also addressed at the ag forum the recent New World screwworm detection.
“Mexico has failed to enforce proper cattle movement controls in infected regions and is not tending to fly traps daily as promised, which hinder our real time detection capabilities,” she said. “This is unacceptable. Mexico must fully implement the agreed upon protocols and must expand surveillance immediately and lock down cattle movement in infected zones.”
Rollins also said USDA is working on short- and long-term solutions to revitalize and diversify the U.S. beef industry.
“Low inventory and high demand is not sustainable,” she said. “If we wish to be a country that can feed ourselves, like so many of the problems that you face, our cattle inventory unfortunately cannot be built rebuilt overnight.”
However, Rollins noted that although the administration plans to incentivize producers to help build back the cattle supply, direct payments would not be part of that plan.
“We see how the government getting involved can completely distort the markets,” she said. “And so currently there will be no plan, no plan is even under consideration to insert ourselves through payments into the beef cattle industry.”
USDA plans to share more information about its revitalization plans in mid-October, which will include opening up more working lands, expanding risk mitigation tools and motivating the next generation of ag producers. — Anna Miller Fortozo, WLJ managing editor
