CFAP Aid for Potatoes Pt 1
I’m Bob Larson. With an industry that’s struggling amid pandemic food service closures, the National Potato Council is calling on the USDA to make some adjustments to who qualifies for relief funding from the Coronavirus Food Assistance Program.
CEO Kam Quarles says the USDA needs better data to make decisions on who qualifies and for how much …
QUARLES … “Effectively, what USDA did a month ago when they rolled their program out is, they said that any commodity that, in their estimation, in the government’s estimation, did not suffer a 5% price decline, or greater, that commodity would not be eligible for the most valuable category of payments under their relief plan.”
And what they found, Quarles says, was incomplete information …
QUARLES … “USDA, their only source of data for this agricultural marketing service data that was generated at terminal markets, effectively wholesale markets. Well, that’s only 6.5% of our business, is conducted at those wholesale markets.”
Which, Quarles says leaves out a huge portion of the potato folks …
QUARLES … “So, you’ve got 93% of our business is conducted elsewhere, and when we went back and looked at all sides of the potato industry, we found actually a 20% national price decline.”
Quarles says the NPC is offering some remedies that would ensure potato growers are provided with fair and equitable access to program funds.
Listen tomorrow for more on CFAP funding for potatoes.
