In a statement released late Monday, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue said, “USDA is not legally authorized to make Market Facilitation Program payments to producers for acreage that is not planted. However, we are exploring legal flexibilities to provide a minimal per acre market facilitation payment to folks who filed prevent plant and chose to plant an MFP-eligible cover crop, with the potential to be harvested and for subsequent use of those cover crops for forage.”
The statement revolved around disaster and trade related assistance recently approved by President Trump. He said he’s been visiting with farmers who have told him, “they’re discouraged, and many are facing difficult decisions about what to do this planting season or if they’ve got the capital to stay in business, but they shouldn’t wait for an announcement to make their decisions. I urge farmers to plant for the market and plant what works best on their farm, regardless of what type of assistance programs USDA is able to provide.”
Perdue added that USDA will provide additional information regarding the Market Facilitation Program payment rates and details of the various components of the disaster relief legislation “in the coming weeks”.
“Given the size and scope of these many disasters, as well as the uncertainty of the final size and scope of this year’s prevented planting acreage, we will use up to $16 billion in support for farmers and the $3 billion in disaster aid to provide as much help as possible to all our affected producers.”