The U.S. Department of Agriculture has announced the availability of up to $10 million in assistance from USDA’s Wildfire and Hurricane Indemnity Program Plus to assist agricultural producers impacted by the worsening drought conditions in the Klamath River Basin.
Earlier today, the Bureau of Reclamation released the Klamath Project 2021 Temporary Operations Plan, which was developed in response to consecutive years of drought conditions in the Klamath Basin, including the lowest historical inflows on record into Upper Klamath Lake this year. As noted in the Bureau of Reclamation’s release today, water from Upper Klamath Lake will become available to charge Klamath Project canals and allow for limited irrigation no earlier than May 15. Remaining project deliveries will begin no earlier than June 1, according to the Bureau.
“As ongoing drought conditions in the West continue to worsen, USDA is committed to providing help and assistance to producers, Tribes, and communities in the Klamath River Basin impacted by historically low water allocations,” said Gloria Montano Greene, Deputy Under Secretary for Farm Production and Conservation.
Other details of the announcement from today:
- Eligibility for drought losses is for 2018 or 2019 and requires a D3 drought rating by on the U.S. Drought Monitor in the county for producers in that county to be eligible;
- States will need to limit payments to 90 percent of the drought losses if the producer had crop insurance or coverage under the Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP) or 70 percent if they did not have coverage or NAP coverage; and
- Producers receiving the payments will need to purchase crop insurance or NAP in 2021 and 2022 if they plant the same crop in 2021 and 2022, for which that suffered the loss.
