Lake Area Farmers To Receive Financial Assistance For COVID-19

Financial help is on the way for farmers across the Lake community.

President Donald Trump says $16 Billion dollars will go directly to farmers in areas like Iberia and Versailles, but you’ll have to sign up first.

Sign-ups will begin on May 26th through your local Farm Service Agency offices. They expect to start issuing payments within one week of receiving application.

Trump says the payments are to help compensate farmers for losses sustained in the fight against COVID-19 and to help “maintain the health of the food supply chain.”

Words from President Trump:

“As part of this program, today we’re announcing 16-billion-dollar direct payments to farmers and ranchers. So $16 billion is going directly to the farmers and ranchers, and it’s authorized by the CARES Act and the Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act. We fought hard for this. These payments will compensate farmers for losses related to the global pandemic, caused by China.

We’ll be providing billions of dollars for corn, cotton, soybean, and specialty crop farmers, cattle ranchers — just about every category. I think we have almost every category, and if we don’t, we’re going to add them. All right? If we left something out. But we have a lot of — a lot of territory. Dairy producers, pork producers, and more.

I read yesterday where we take some cattle in from other countries because we have trade deals. I think you should look at terminating those deals. All right? We have trade deals where we actually take in cattle, and we have a lot of cattle in this country. And I think you should look at the possibility of terminating those trade deals. Now, if a country has been a great country and a great ally and a great friend, it’s — you know, you have to do that. But there are some countries that are sending us cattle, for many years, and I think we should look at terminating.

We’re very self-sufficient, and we’re becoming more and more self-sufficient. Probably one of the reasons I got elected.

Sign-ups will begin on May 26th through your local Farm Service Agency offices. You got to go sign up to pick it up, to get the money. And we’ll start issuing payments within one week of receiving application. So that’s a lot of money. You’re talking about a total of $16 billion plus $3 billion.

And, you know, we bought, last week — and it’s already in distribution — $3 billion worth of product for the food lines. And it’s — this is already in distribution. I see that they’re handing it out. I see where they couldn’t get food, they’re having a hard time. And we have these incredible ranchers and farmers that have so much food. And I said, let’s spend that money and give it to our farmers, our ranchers. And it’s worked out really well. So — and they’ve already got it in supply. That’s already on the lines. I saw them handing it out today, and a couple of days ago, actually. It’s fantastic how quickly it worked.

In addition, this important initiative also includes the new Farmers to Families Food Box program, which Ivanka and Secretary Perdue helped officially launch on Friday. Through this effort, the Department of Agriculture will work with local food distribution companies — and we have a lot of great distribution companies; I’ve gotten to meet some of them — which have also been hit very hard — to purchase $3 billion of food and produce from the American farmer, which I just mentioned, and to deliver it to the foodbanks and charities that serve needy families.

Already, we have allocated $1.2 billion to Farmers to Families, funding through 198 contracts with distribution companies, many of which are small businesses adversely impacted also by this horrible plague. It’s a plague.”