USDA: 6.8% Sequester Cut

OMAHA (DTN) -- Farmers will take a 6.8% cut in their farm-program payments because of federal sequestration rules, Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack said Wednesday at a House Agriculture Committee hearing on dietary guidelines.

The cut covers several USDA programs, including the Agricultural Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) programs. It also affects marketing loans, sugar loans and the Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program.

Payments under PLC and ARC for 2014 will be cut 6.8% no matter when a farmer went to a Farm Service Agency county office to sign up, Vilsack said.

Payments will go out to farmers in the next few weeks, a USDA spokesperson told DTN late last week.

Federal budget sequestration was passed by Congress in 2011 and officially kicked in during 2013. The legislation detailed specific percentage cuts for mandatory and discretionary federal programs.

USDA detailed some of the programs cut in 2013, but that was prior to the passage of the latest version of the farm bill. Ideally, a new list will be generated to provide full details of all the affected programs.

In 2013, USDA did state that Conservation Reserve Program payments were not affected by sequester cuts.

Editor's note: DTN Political Correspondent Jerry Hagstrom contributed to this article.

Chris Clayton can be reached at chris.clayton@dtn.com

(AG/CZ)

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