The National Association of State Departments of Agriculture says it has a plan designed to take extra dairy, pork and poultry supplies off the market, stabilizing prices paid to producers while making more protein-rich foods available to food banks, school lunch programs and other food assistance programs. The proposal grew from discussions held during NASDA's annual meeting in Alabama.
The proposal, known as 'Meat the Need', is designed to use money previously authorized by Congress to purchase cheese and other dairy products in up to three installments of 75 million pounds each over 120 days. If the target price of $16 per hundredweight of milk, the cost of production, is reached before the second or third installment, the purchases would stop.
Likewise, the government would purchase up to three installments of 100 million pounds of pork products over 180 days until a target price of 49 cents per pound, the average cost of production, is reached. The plan also includes a one-time purchase of 100 million pounds of turkey.
North Carolina Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler called this a bold solution that would allow the USDA to increase allocations to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and beneficiaries would spend the new allocations on meat and possibly dairy products. Troxler said these products would be available at grocery stores, and participants would be given separate electronic benefits transfer cards to purchase the products.