Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack on Sept. 25 participated in a White Home press briefing the place he mentioned how USDA operations, rural America and work on the 2023 Farm Invoice might be impacted by the looming authorities shutdown.
Congress has till Sept. 30 to go laws funding the federal government. If lawmakers fail to take motion, impacts of the shutdown will start to be felt on Oct. 1.
Vilsack served as ag secretary through the 2013 authorities shutdown and mentioned he remembers the useless challenges and disruptions it prompted.
Whereas the affect on USDA’s diet applications, together with SNAP and WIC, is properly publicized, many extra of USDA’s applications are going through disruption.
“Now could be the time when farmers are harvesting their crops and so they’re searching for advertising loans, which permit them and help them in making certain that they get a good worth for his or her crop,” Vilsack mentioned. “When we now have a shutdown, Farm Service Company workplaces in nearly each county of this nation shut down and people loans usually are not accessible.”
The lack to safe these loans will put small- and mid-sized farming operations in danger, impacting their means to pay their payments and ensure they’ll harvest their crop, Vilsack defined. If they’ll’t harvest their crops, these farmers is not going to revenue and will danger shedding their farms. “It creates an amazing quantity of stress,” he added.
In keeping with Vilsack, greater than 50,000 USDA workers are anticipated to be furloughed within the occasion of a authorities shutdown. The furlough would affect USDA operations in each county within the nation, he mentioned, together with Farm Service Company and Rural Improvement workplaces. Many different USDA departments can be impacted, together with researchers and different workers who work for the Agricultural Analysis Service.
A authorities shutdown would additionally affect USDA’s means to supply technical help concerning the event of the 2023 Farm Invoice, which is already far not on time.
A full copy of Vilsack’s feedback is obtainable on the White Home web site.
