Contract growers of hogs, poultry and eggs are eligible for an estimated $1.98 billion in coronavirus aid, announced the USDA. The payments, along with a “top up” of aid to hog farmers, are the first to flow from the $13 billion earmarked for agricultural assistance in the pandemic relief bill enacted last month.
Signup opens on Tuesday for contract growers and runs through Feb 26. The “top up” money for hog farmers will go to producers who enrolled for the first version of the Coronavirus Food Assistance Program (CFAP1) last summer.
Payments could total $3.1 billion from the latest assistance, including $1.98 billion to contract growers, $810 million for hog producers and $210 million due to inclusion of turf grass sod, pullets and animal byproducts as commodities eligible for aid under CFAP2, the second USDA iteration of coronavirus aid. Payments to contract growers may be pro-rated, said the USDA.
“We are pleased that after several months of discussions…our hard-working chicken growers that were impacted by Covid-19 will finally get some relief,” said Mike Brown, president of the National Chicken Council, a trade group for the broiler chicken industry. Contract growers were left out of CFAP1 and CFAP2, though livestock owners were aided.
Under the $900 billion coronavirus package enacted at the end of December, farmers who produced hogs, broilers, pullets, layers, chicken eggs and turkeys under contract with the owner of the animals and who suffered a loss in revenue due to market disruptions and “reduced harvesting facility output” resulting from the pandemic are eligible for compensation. Payments would be a maximum of 80 percent of the loss. “Only those producers who grow or produce an eligible commodity under contract for or on behalf of another person or entity and are not entitled to a share from sales proceeds of the commodity are eligible,” said the USDA.
The “top up” payments to hog farmers will be $17 per head and would double the amount that producers received through CFAP1. The initial payments were based on hogs waiting to be sold when the pandemic hit and on a producer’s hog inventory in late spring. “This additional assistance is also intended to help swine producers who face continuing market disruptions from changes in U.S. meat consumption due to the pandemic,” said the USDA.
Futures prices for market hogs at the end of last November were 5.4 percent lower than they were at the start of 2020, said the USDA. By contrast, futures prices for corn and soybeans rallied in late summer 2020 and ended the year higher than they were at the start of 2020.
“This additional assistance builds on to the $23.6 billion in assistance already provided to our farmers and ranchers impacted by the pandemic, and we will continue to implement other provisions enacted by Congress,” said Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue.
The Federal Register notice of the payments is available here.