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Farm Service Agency Public Affairs Staff 1400 Independence Ave SW Stop 0506, Room 3624-South Washington, D.C. 20250-0506
Release No. 1452.08
Latawnya Dia (202) 720-7962
Decision Allows Farmers and Ranchers to Apply for USDA Assistance
WASHINGTON, July 18, 2008 - The U.S. Department of Agriculture designated nine counties in Oklahoma as primary natural disaster areas because of losses caused by the combined effects of drought, extreme heat and high winds that occurred from Jan. 1, 2008, and continuing. Those counties are:
Beaver | Ellis | Texas |
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Cimarron | Harper | Woods |
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Dewey | Roger Mills | Woodward |
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Farm operators in Alfalfa, Beckham, Blaine, Custer and Major counties in Oklahoma also qualify for natural disaster benefits because their counties are contiguous.
Farm operators in counties in the adjacent states of Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico and Texas listed below also qualify for natural disaster benefits because their counties are contiguous.
Benton | Little River | Scott | Sevier |
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Crawford | Polk | Sebastian | Washington |
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Baca
Barber | Cowley | Morton |
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Chautauqua | Harper | Seward |
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Cherokee | Labette | Steven |
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Clark | Meade | Summer |
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Comanche | Montgomery | |
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McDonald and Newton
Union
Bowie | Dallam | Hemphill | Red River |
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Childress | Fannin | Lamar | Sherman |
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Clay | Grayson | Lipscomb | Wheeler |
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Collingsworth | Hansford | Montague | Wichita |
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Cooke | Hardeman | Ochiltree | Wilbarger |
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All counties listed above were designated natural disaster areas on July 16, 2008, making all qualified farm operators in the designated areas eligible for low interest emergency (EM) loans from USDA's Farm Service Agency (FSA), provided eligibility requirements are met. Farmers in eligible counties have eight months from the date of the declaration to apply for loans to help cover part of their actual losses. FSA will consider each loan application on its own merits, taking into account the extent of losses, security available and repayment ability. FSA has a variety of programs, in addition to the EM loan program, to help eligible farmers recover from adversity.
USDA has also made other programs available to assist farmers and ranchers, including the Emergency Conservation Program, Federal Crop Insurance and the Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program. Interested farmers may contact their local USDA Service Centers for further information on eligibility requirements and application procedures for these and other programs. Additional information is also available online at: http://disaster.fsa.usda.gov.
FSA news releases are available on FSA's Web site at: http://www.fsa.usda.gov via the "News and Events" link.
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