OMAHA (DTN) -- USDA on Wednesday announced it is awarding $120 million to six fertilizer production projects through the Fertilizer Production Expansion Program (FPEP), according to a USDA news release. FPEP is funded by the Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) and provides funding to independent business owners to help them modernize equipment, adopt new technologies and build production plants.
USDA Deputy Secretary Xochitl Torres Small announced the funding at Dramm Corporation in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, on Wednesday morning. The company was a previous FPEP recipient and is using a $776,000 grant to increase production capacity to expand its network of customers and farmers. Dramm produces a liquid fish fertilizer suitable for organic and traditional farming while keeping millions of pounds of waste out of landfills and fresh waterways.
USDA also announced on Wednesday $20.2 million in awards to 26 projects through the Local Meat Capacity (Local MCap) grant program to expand capacity within the meat and poultry industry. Like FPEP, this project aims to add new jobs to local communities and provides producers with more options to ensure their products get to market.
"When we invest in domestic supply chains, we drive down input costs and increase options for farmers," Torres Small said. "Through today's investments to make more fertilizer and process meat locally, the Biden-Harris Administration is bringing jobs back to the United States, lowering costs for families and support farmer income."
The six fertilizer projects are in Arkansas, California, Illinois, South Dakota, Washington and Wisconsin.
The Arkansas project will be used to assist with the expansion of an existing urea and ammonium nitrate fertilizer production facility located in El Dorado, Arkansas. The amount of the Arkansas project is $77 million.
LSB Industries, a publicly traded manufacturing and processing corporation, will increase capacity of the facility to over 580,000 tons annually. The expanded capacity will allow products to be available to roughly 450,000 producers within a four-state region. This project is expected to create 20 full-time positions.
In South Dakota, $3 million was awarded to Agtegra Cooperative, a 100-year-old business operating at 70 locations throughout the Dakotas. This Rural Development investment will be used to help offset the costs of constructing a 21,000-square-foot fertilizer manufacturing building and install two storage tanks with a combined capacity of 950,000 gallons in Ipswich, South Dakota.
The project will also install a 500,000-gallon storage tank at each of its facilities in McLaughlin and Kimball, South Dakota. When operational, the cooperatives fertilizer production will increase from 26,175 tons to 53,270 tons per year.
USDA has invested over $368 million in 67 projects through FPEP, creating new jobs and increasing domestic fertilizer production across the country, according to the release. The Biden administration created FPEP to tackle issue facing American farmers due to the rising fertilizer prices, which more than doubled between 2021 and 2022 due to various issues.
The Biden administration committed up to $900 million through the CCC for FPEP. Funding supports long-term investments that will strengthen supply chains, create new economic opportunities for American businesses and support climate-smart innovation, according to USDA.
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