07.20.22

Hoeven: USDA Increases LIP Payment Rates for Calves Under 400 Pounds

Senator Worked to Ensure LIP Reflects Actual Market Rates, Repeatedly Raised Issue with Ag Secretary Vilsack

WASHINGTON – Senator John Hoeven, Ranking Member of the Senate Agriculture Appropriations Committee and a senior member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, today announced that the Farm Service Agency (FSA) has: 

  • Updated its payment rates under the Livestock Indemnity Program (LIP) for calves weighing less than 250 pounds, which will now be valued the same as non-adult cattle weighing between 250 and 399 pounds.
  • Increased payment rates for calves under 400 pounds to more accurately reflect the increased cost of these livestock in 2022.

This follows Hoeven’s efforts to ensure the LIP national payment rates reflect actual market rates to help ranchers more effectively recover from losses due to severe spring storms. LIP applications that were already paid in 2022 will be recalculated to include the updated amounts.

“We appreciate Secretary Vilsack and Administrator Ducheneaux for working with us to update these LIP payment rates, which previously had not reflected ranchers’ true losses,” said Hoeven. “This improved assistance will help ranchers to better recover their operations following the severe weather that hit during calving season this year, and builds upon the assistance we secured under ELRP to address the impacts of last year’s historic drought.”

After hearing producers’ concerns at a roundtable discussion he held earlier this year, Hoeven raised the issue to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and FSA Administrator Zach Ducheneaux, both in meetings and at a Senate committee hearing, pressing them to update the LIP payment rates and to ensure the program adequately covers losses due to eligible diseases. The full list of 2022 LIP national payment rates can be found here.

 

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