Vilsack: No Government Program To Help U-S Hog Farmers
April 9, 2014 8:43am
U-S Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack says PED has already killed at least 5 million piglets in that country.
He says that number continues to climb.
But Vilsack says the government doesn’t really have any programs that could compensate U-S pork producers for their losses.
He says the one program that comes closest to covering situations like PED is the so-called ELAP program – the Emergency Assistance for Livestock, Honey Bees and Farm Raised Fish program.
But Vilsack says that program’s budget is only 20 million dollars – about a tenth of what he thinks would be required to properly compensate American hog farmers for PED losses.