Dairy farmers have lost at least $1 billion due to the trade war, so the USDA should revise its bailout plan, said the National Milk Producers Federation on Wednesday. The bailout package announced by the Trump administration in August allotted just $127 million for dairy farmers — the equivalent of 1 cent a gallon of milk.
In a letter to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, the dairy group said that “our members are greatly concerned about the level of aid that was provided in the initial effort.” The USDA will decide in early December whether to issue a second round of payments. “We are eager to work with you on a plan that better reflects the struggles dairy producers across the country have faced due to the tariffs,” said NMPF chairman Randy Mooney, a Missouri dairy farmer.
To bolster its point, the dairy group included the results of four analyses that point to industry losses of at least $1 billion this year because of retaliatory tariffs.
Other farm groups have also questioned the payment rates. Aid to corn growers was set at 1 cent a bushel and wheat growers at 14 cents a bushel. Soybean growers, on the other hand, would be compensated at $1.65 a bushel, which means they would get up to $3.6 billion of the $4.7 billion the USDA said would be provided to cotton, corn, dairy, pork, soybean, sorghum, and wheat producers. There is a separate payment limit of $125,000 for crops and for livestock, meaning a diversified operator could collect $250,000.
(Corrects headline and first paragraph to make clear the bailout package amounts to 1 penny per gallon).