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Emergency relief program phase two sign-up starts soon

USDA is rolling out the second phase of the Emergency Relief Program later this month. Farm Service Agency Administrator Zach Ducheneaux tells Brownfield this helps producers not covered by crop insurance or NAP with crop losses for disasters in 2020 and 2021.

“Producers can choose their reference year for eligible revenue and then, use the disaster-related year as a yardstick to measure against the normal year. ERP phase two is going to provide a payment based on the difference there.”

The FSA will be accepting applications for ERP – phase two from January 23 through June 2.

“Because of the nature of the available funding, we will be applying a factor to the payment to make sure we get all of the money properly allocated.”

He says farmers can use a tax return to fill out an ERP form to take into their local FSA office to apply.

The first phase of ERP paid more than $7.3 billion for crop producers experiencing natural disasters in 2020 and 2021. The top states receiving disaster aid in the first phase of ERP include North Dakota, Texas, South Dakota, Minnesota and Iowa.

Ducheneaux also says FSA is starting to take a closer look at how to implement 2022 disaster aid, approved in December.