Quality Loss Assistance Signup Now Available for 18-19 Disasters

The United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Farm Service Agency (FSA) announced that signup for the Quality Loss Adjustment (QLA) Program began Jan. 6 and will end March 5, 2021. The QLA provides assistance to producers who suffered eligible crop quality losses due to natural disasters occurring in 2018 and 2019.

 

“The past few years have been marked with a variety of natural disasters from droughts to snowstorms, excessive moisture and flooding,” Agriculture Commissioner Doug Goehring said. “The QLA program will bring relief to those impacted by these unforeseen events in counties that received a qualifying Presidential Emergency Disaster Declaration or Secretarial Disaster Designation.”

 

Counties eligible for assistance due to D3 drought in 2018 were: Eddy, Foster, McHenry, Nelson, Renville, Ward and Wells. Counties eligible for assistance due to 2019 disasters were: Adams, Barnes, Benson, Billings, Bottineau, Bowman, Burke, Burleigh, Cass, Cavalier, Dickey, Divide, Dunn, Eddy, Emmons, Foster, Golden Valley, Grand Forks, Grant, Griggs, Hettinger, Kidder, LaMoure, Logan, McLean, McHenry, McIntosh, McKenzie, Mercer, Morton, Mountrail, Nelson, Oliver, Pembina, Pierce, Ramsey, Ransom, Renville, Richland, Rolette, Sargent, Sheridan, Sioux, Slope, Stark, Steele, Stutsman, Towner, Traill, Walsh, Ward, Wells and Williams. Producers in other counties may still apply for QLA, but must provide supporting documentation to establish that the crop was directly affected by a qualifying disaster event.

 

Crops that can be covered by federal crop insurance or the Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP) are generally considered eligible for QLA with some exclusions. A crop must have suffered a quality loss due to a qualifying disaster event and had a five-percent-or-greater quality discount due to the qualifying disaster event. Eligible crops may have been sold, fed on-farm to livestock, or may be in storage at the time of application. Crops that were destroyed before harvest are not eligible.

Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.