Agricultural News
Plains Cotton Growers Commends USDA for Providing Assistance to Cotton Producers
Mon, 06 Jun 2016 18:38:08 CDT
Plains Cotton Growers, Inc., commended the U.S. Department of Agriculture today for creating a Cotton Ginning Cost-Share program that will provide an estimated $300 million in much-needed assistance to growers across the Cotton Belt.
"We greatly appreciate U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and the USDA for listening to the concerns of cotton producers and coming up with a viable short-term solution that will help us face some of our challenges," PCG President Johnie Reed, a cotton producer from Kress, said.
This one-time payment will be available upon signup, which will begin June 20 and run through August 5. Producers should contact their local Farm Service Agency office. According to a USDA news release, payments are expected to begin in July.
Qualifying payments will be determined by a producer's 2015 cotton acres reported to FSA, multiplied by 40 percent of the average ginning cost for each production region. Payments to Texas producers will be $36.97 per acre. The program has the same eligibility requirements as were used for the 2014 Cotton Transition Assistance Program, including a $40,000 per producer payment limit, requirement to be actively engaged in farming, meet conservation compliance and a $900,000 adjusted gross income limit.
"We had hoped for some flexibility in the payment limit, but we are grateful for the assistance, because our producers certainly need it," Reed said. "We recognize that this is a program for the near term, and we remain committed to working with Congress and others in trying to establish cottonseed as an 'other oilseed' under Title I of the 2014 Farm Bill, which would provide long-term stability for our industry."
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