USDA to help cotton producers amid price slump
08/06/2016
“The Cotton Ginning Cost Share program will offer meaningful, timely and targeted assistance to cotton growers to help with their anticipated ginning costs and to facilitate marketing,” said US secretary of agriculture Tom Vilsack.
The payments will be calculated by multiplying the producer’s cotton acreage in 2015 by 40% of the average regional ginning cost. Mr Vilsack estimated that the average payment would be around60% more than producers and farmers received in 2014 under a cotton assistance programme.
Cotton prices have fallen sharply during 2016 due to China’s decision to move away from its strategy of stockpiling it to increase the prices paid to domestic farmers. The Cotton Council says that the average price of cotton this year is 67.5 cents per pound, compared to 90.4 cents in 2013. US farmers are earning approximately 56.6 cents per pound, according to the most recent data.
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