WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department
of Agriculture (USDA) today announced the details of additional assistance for
dairy producers, including a second round of payments through the Pandemic
Market Volatility Assistance Program (PMVAP) and a new Organic Dairy Marketing
Assistance Program (ODMAP). The update to PMVAP and the new ODMAP will enable
USDA to better support small- and medium-sized dairy operations who weathered
the pandemic and now face other challenges.
“The
Biden-Harris administration continues to fulfill its commitments to fill gaps
in pandemic assistance for producers. USDA is announcing a second set of
payments of nearly $100 million to close-out the $350 million commitment under
PMVAP through partnerships with dairy handlers and cooperatives to deliver the
payments,” said USDA Under Secretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs
Jenny Lester Moffitt. “USDA is also announcing new assistance targeted to small
to medium size organic dairy farmers to help with anticipated marketing costs
as they face a variety of challenges from weather to supply-chain challenges.”
Pandemic Market Volatility Assistance Program
PMVAP
assists producers who received a lower value due to market abnormalities caused
by the pandemic and ensuing Federal policies. As a result of the production cap
increase, USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) will make PMVAP payments
to eligible dairy farmers for fluid milk sales between 5 million and 9 million
pounds from July through December 2020. This level of production was not
eligible for payment under the first round of the PMVAP. Payment rates will be
identical to the first round of payments, 80 percent of the revenue difference
per month, on fluid milk sales from 5 million to 9 million pounds from July
through December 2020. USDA will again distribute monies through agreements
with independent handlers and cooperatives, with reimbursement to handlers for
allowed administrative costs. USDA will contact handlers with eligible
producers to notify them of the opportunity to participate.
As
part of the first round, PMVAP paid eligible dairy farmers on up to 5 million
pounds of fluid milk sales from July through December 2020. The first round of
payments distributed over $250 million in payments to over 25,000 eligible
dairy farmers. These dairy farmers received the full allowable reimbursement on
fluid milk sales up to 5 million pounds.
More
information about the PMVAP production cap increase is available at www.ams.usda.gov/pmvap.
Organic Dairy Marketing Assistance Program
The
new ODMAP, to be administered by USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA), is intended
to help smaller organic dairy farms that have faced a unique set of challenges
and higher costs over the past several years that have been compounded by the
ongoing pandemic and drought conditions across the country. Many small organic
dairy operations are now struggling to stay in business and FSA plans to
provide payments to cover a portion of their estimated marketing costs for
2023. Final spending will depend on enrollment and each producers projected
production, but ODMAP has been allocated up to $100 million.
The
assistance provided by ODMAP will be provided through unused Commodity Credit Corporation
funds remaining from earlier pandemic assistance programs. The assistance will
help eligible organic dairy producers with up to 75 percent of their future
projected marketing costs in 2023, based on national estimates of marketing
costs. This assistance will be provided through a streamlined application
process based on a national per hundredweight payment. The payments will be
capped at the first five million pounds of anticipated production, in alignment
with preexisting dairy programs that target assistance to those smaller dairies
that are most vulnerable to marketing challenges. This program is still in
development.
Details
about the Organic Dairy Marketing Assistance Program will be available and
updated at www.farmers.gov as more
details are released in a Notice of Funds Availability later this year.