USDA figures

[On Our own]

OK this is waaay outside my field, but some one told me the usda reports on crop yields was not kosher.

It was a reasonably reliable person, some one I know not an internet troll. SO I decided to look, but I cannot really make heads nor tails out of their numbers.

The guy said the counties all reporting severe emergencies due to weather were listing huge crops. He said one side is showing huge crop losses while they are reporting officially that the crops are big as ever if not bigger!

Can anyone tell me if there is any veracity to this?

 

[Wolf-Kim]

Can you further explain what you're talking about?

Not trying to be rude (and it might just be me) but I don't understand what you're asking or talking about. Like I said, it might just be me.

 

[Wifezilla]

I did some google sleuthing but didn't find any references to number weirdness in the crop reports. Do you have some links?

 

[On Our own]

Here's what I have so far. What I am talking about is a accusation that the USDA is not showing the true crop numbers. The idea is that weather related issues have had a worse impact on crops and food supply than the USDA is letting on.

http://www.fema.gov/femaNews/disasterSearch.do Weather related disaster areas, you can search by the type of disaster ie hurricane, freeze, drought or even industry type, but I could not find one specifically on agriculture

http://www.thetreeofliberty.com/vb/showthread.php?t=87117

OK this is just a thread including some guys blog, but I found this type of blog using these same charts in many places. I just cant find the origin of the charts. Could be one guy blogged and then was referred to by so many people he started to look legit.


http://disasterandemergencysurvival.com/archives/food-crisis-2009

A survival page I check out on the crop issues

http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/!ut/..._5JN_navtype=RT&PC_7_2_5JN_parentnav=NEWSROOM

USDA crop report. Yes, there are some counties or states whose production is down, but the discrepancies dont look huge.

Are the discrepancies bigger than I see, or does it end up looking bigger when it isn't broken down so minutely?

 

[Wifezilla]

What I am talking about is a accusation that the USDA is not showing the true crop numbers. The idea is that weather related issues have had a worse impact on crops and food supply than the USDA is letting on.

Ahhhhh. OK. Now I see what you are saying.

I just cant find the origin of the charts. Could be one guy blogged and then was referred to by so many people he started to look legit.

Good observation.

It does seem weird with all the problems we read summer-fall that suddenly we have all this food when tomatoes, pumpkins and everything else was "rotting in the fields" a month ago.

Curiouser and curiouser....

 

[Wifezilla]

"Fall flooding could cost Louisiana farmers more than $360 million, with most of those losses coming in northeastern Louisiana, LSU AgCenter economist Kurt Guidry estimated this week.

Heavy rains soaked fields throughout September and October, forcing many producers to abandon some rotten crops and greatly reducing the quality and yield of what was harvested. The 2009 harvest followed the 2008 harvest disaster, when Hurricanes Gustav and Ike caused $1 billion in losses.

When youre getting rain every other day, it really limits in terms of producers being able to get into the field, Guidry said. And in certain cases, that rain every other day was significant 2 to 3 inches.

Guidry estimated cotton lost about 63 percent of its value, sweet potatoes losses exceeded 50 percent and about a third of the soybean crops value was lost. Losses to rice and sugarcane were less than 10 percent.

Morehouse Parish producer Venoy Kinnaird said a 50 percent loss of his sweet potato crop would be a best-case scenario, but he wont be able to tally the total loss until after the potatoes are cured. He lost about 70 percent of his soybean crop.
Ive never seen two years in a row like this, Kinnaird said. It was a bad year across the board.

Tensas Parish producer Ben Guthrie received 17 inches of rain in October on his 8,500 acres of cotton, a crop that already had been delayed by a dry July.

Ive never seen cotton do this; the stems just rotted, Guthrie said. We had big, fluffy bolls that just deteriorated and never made it into the pickers. We thought we had 1,100-1,200 pound per acre crop, but only picked about 650 pounds per acre.
To compound matters, he said his cotton suffered quality losses averaging about 8 cents per pound.

Louisiana Agriculture Commissioner Mike Strain said hes lobbying for proposed legislation that would provide direct assistance payments to farmers.

Strain also said the U.S. Department of Agriculture must implement its Supplemental Revenue Assistance Payments program thats already part of the 2008 Farm Bill. The commissioner said the SURE program would provide payments for 2008 crop losses.

Weve got to get the SURE program in gear, Strain said.

Guthrie said if he was provided immediate disaster assistance through an additional direct payment, it would probably put his operation back to break-even status.

Were just going to have to carry over that loss until next year and hope 2010 is a good year, he said. I know some farmers that wont be able to farm next year.

Were having to pinch pennies everywhere we can, including cutting back on equipment purchases and labor. I believe the disaster legislation that has been proposed is fair and reasonable. If we can bail out manmade disasters, surely we can assist those affected by natural disasters."

http://www.thenewsstar.com/article/20091223/UPDATES01/91223018

 

[Wifezilla]

"SBA Disaster Loans Available Following Secretary of Agriculture Disaster Declaration in Georgia

ATLANTA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The U.S. Small Business Administration announces today that federal economic injury disaster loans are available to small businesses, small agricultural cooperatives and most private non-profit organizations of all sizes located in Georgia as a result of severe storms and flooding that began on September 18, 2009.

When the Secretary of Agriculture issues a disaster declaration to help farmers recover from damages and losses to crops, the Small Business Administration issues a declaration to assist eligible entities affected by the same disaster

These loans are available in the following counties: Barrow, Bartow, Ben Hill, Bibb, Carroll, Catoosa, Chattooga, Cherokee, Clarke, Cobb, Coweta, Crawford, Crisp, Dade, Dawson, Dodge, Dooly, Douglas, Fannin, Floyd, Forsyth, Fulton, Gilmer, Gordon, Greene, Gwinnett, Habersham, Hall, Haralson, Heard, Houston, Jackson, Jasper, Lumpkin, Macon, Monroe, Morgan, Murray, Newton, Oconee, Oglethorpe, Paulding, Peach, Pickens, Polk, Pulaski, Putman, Rabun, Rockdale, Taylor, Telfair, Towns, Turner, Union, Upson, Walker, Walton, White, Whitfield, and Wilcox in Georgia.

When the Secretary of Agriculture issues a disaster declaration to help farmers recover from damages and losses to crops, the Small Business Administration issues a declaration to assist eligible entities affected by the same disaster, said Frank Skaggs, director of SBAs Field Operations Center East.

Under this declaration, the SBAs Economic Injury Disaster Loan program is available to eligible farm-related and nonfarm-related entities of all sizes that suffered financial losses as a direct result of this disaster. Farmers and ranchers are not eligible to apply to SBA.

Victims may qualify for loans up to $2 million. These loans are available at a 4 percent interest rate with loan terms up to 30 years. The SBA determines eligibility based on the size of the applicant, type of activity and its financial resources. Loan amounts and terms are set by the SBA and are based on each applicants financial condition. Under this disaster declaration, the SBA cannot provide loans to agricultural producers.

Disaster loan information and application forms may be obtained by calling the SBAs Customer Service Center at 1-800-659-2955 (1-800-877-8339 for the hearing-impaired) Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. EST or by sending an e-mail to disastercustomerservice@sba.gov. Loan applications can be downloaded from the SBAs Web site at www.sba.gov/services/disasterassistance. Completed applications should be mailed to: U.S. Small Business Administration, Processing and Disbursement Center, 14925 Kingsport Road, Fort Worth, TX 76155.

Those affected by the disaster may apply for disaster loans from SBAs secure Web site at https://disasterloan.sba.gov/ela/."

http://www.businesswire.com/portal/...d=news_view&newsId=20091217006211&newsLang=en

 

[Wifezilla]

"Southern lawmakers seek emergency aid for farmers
By BECKY BOHRER (AP) Dec 14, 2009
NEW ORLEANS Some Southern lawmakers are seeking billions of dollars in emergency aid for farmers after recent natural disaster declarations in at least 20 states.
A farm disaster program authorized by Congress last year still isn't fully in place, and even if it was, some lawmakers say its design could keep many farmers with losses this year waiting for help until January 2011. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's disaster declarations allow farmers affected by weather ranging from hail to volcanic emissions to seek low-interest loans or other assistance, but some debt-laden farmers say the last thing they need is another loan.
In Louisiana and Mississippi, early season drought and late-season rains compounded the losses many growers suffered due to the 2008 hurricanes. Lawmakers from Mississippi and Arkansas are helping lead a push for at least $2.1 billion in emergency farm aid and hope to gain approval by year's end from a Congress that has been focused on other spending packages and the health care debate.
"I believe we have a good argument for providing direct payments to farmers whose crops have been ruined this year by floods, drought and other disaster conditions," said Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss.
Ted McDermott is grateful for the effort, but questions whether it will help him much. The northeast Louisiana sweet potato grower said he filed for bankruptcy after last year's storms left him with rotten potatoes, fields too wet to harvest and loans he couldn't pay off. He managed to plant 100 acres this year but the seemingly unrelenting rains in September and October left him with more rotted potatoes and the prospect of having to leave the state to find work.
"I think my business is done," said the 41-year-old from Oak Grove, who is still waiting for money from a grant and loan program the state set up with federal money after hurricanes Gustav and Ike.
"I needed help in the spring of 2009, coming out of my '08 losses, and I think at this point, I'm too far in the hole to come out of it. Unless they want to write a lot of my debt off," McDermott said, "and I doubt seriously they'll want to do that."
Over the past decade, Congress has approved multiple emergency aid packages for farmers and ranchers hurt by bad weather. But farm-state lawmakers often faced a hard sell with colleagues worried about the cost and their own constituents' needs. And in some cases, farmers still had to wait a year or more for help.
Last year, members of North Dakota's congressional delegation helped lead an effort to add a farm disaster program to the latest multiyear version of the federal farm bill. Lawmakers agreed to limit the cost of the program in part by basing aid on farmers' total income.
That means a farmer who lost a lot of cotton, which is expensive to produce, but made money on corn or soybeans harvested earlier might not get any aid. Southern farmers, who often plant multiple crops, say the program could end up favoring one-crop farms that are more often seen in the Midwest.
Past emergency aid has often been based on the amount of a crop lost. Gary Adams, chief economist for the National Cotton Council, said that type of direct assistance will likely still be needed even after the farm disaster program is set up.
"I think we have a good idea of what it will and won't provide," Adams said of the new farm disaster program, "and the financial hole that's left for farmers is fairly significant."
In Kelsey McKoin's case, a federal bailout could make the difference in getting financing to plant next year. The 57-year-old lost all the sweet potatoes on his farm, near Bonita in north Louisiana, last year and expects big losses again this year. He said his crop insurance didn't provide help.
A federal loan he got last year did, "but that has to be repaid. They made me sign a piece of paper saying they'd come get my house if I didn't pay it," he said. "It's hard to do it you can't control the weather or government programs.""
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hZHqDyvE57s6IVom8lr2BXPdRNGgD9CIVPDO0

 

[Wifezilla]

" December 10, 2009

Adams County farmers qualify

for USDA natural disaster help



The U.S. Department of Agriculture has designated six counties in Washington as primary natural disaster areas due to losses caused by drought that occurred from Jan. 1, 2009, and continuing.

Chelan, Douglas, Ferry, Grant, Lincoln and Okanogan Counties are designated as primary natural disaster areas.

In addition, farm operators in Adams, Benton, Franklin, King, Kittitas, Skagit, Snohomish, Spokane, Stevens, Whatcom, Yakima and Whitman Counties also qualify for natural disaster assistance because the counties are contiguous.

President Obama and I understand these conditions caused severe damage to the area and serious harm to farms in Washington and we want to help, said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. This action will provide help to hundreds of farmers who suffered significant production losses to wheat, rangeland and pasture.

All counties listed were designated natural disaster areas Nov. 24, 2009, making all qualified farm operators in the designated areas eligible for low interest emergency (EM) loans from USDA's Farm Service Agency (FSA), provided eligibility requirements are met.

Farmers in eligible counties have eight months from the date of the declaration to apply for loans to help cover part of their actual losses.

FSA will consider each loan application on its own merits, taking into account the extent of losses, security available and repayment ability.

FSA has variety of programs, in addition to the EM loan program, to help eligible farmers recover from adversity."
http://www.ritzvillejournal.com/arc...rs qualify for USDA natural disaster help.htm

 

[Wifezilla]

VERONA, Miss. (AP) - North Mississippi farmers say a dry summer and wet autumn ruined many of their crops, and a bad economy is compounding their problems.

The Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal reports about 100 farmers met Monday with Democratic Congressman Travis Childers and a high-ranking agriculture official.

Some farmers say they can't get credit, and others say crop insurance regulations are costing them money.

Childers says he and Rep. Marion Berry of Arkansas introduced legislation to help farmers through crop disasters, but he doesn't know when it'll be considered.

Farmer Billy Sprain of Prentiss County says weather ruined his bean crops.

Michael Scuse, USDA undersecretary for farm and foreign agricultural services, told the farmers he understands their challenges. He's been a farmer in Delaware.

Information from: Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal, http://nems360.com/

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://www.wxvt.com/Global/story.asp?S=11674538