WASHINGTON, D.C – The USDA will be offering $8 billion in assistance for U.S. farmers through the new Harvest Fuel Relief (HFR) Program, which the agency said will provide one-time payments to farmers facing higher fuel and input costs, and ongoing market disruptions during this year’s harvest season.

Authorized under the Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act and run by the USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA), HFR’s payment rates will be released sometime in November, with the payment method for other eligible commodities to be announced later, the agency added.

Andrew P. Griffith, University of Tennessee professor of agricultural and resource economics, who’s also a row crop farmer and cattle producer, told Farm World he doubts there will be any farmers who will turn down payments of any sort related to their farming endeavors.

“However, I think most farmers would agree that an ad hoc payment is not the solution,” he said. “The preference would be to treat the problem instead of the symptom. In other words, I think most farmers would prefer the president work to lower fuel prices.”

As a farmer, he said he has a few acres of row crops and does some custom harvesting, adding that he went through several gallons of diesel this fall: “It was not fun writing the checks to refill bulk fuel tanks, but it is also difficult to operate equipment without fuel.”

As an economist, he said the thought is similar: “There are good reasons for government payments as it relates to food security and farm viability, but these types of payments should be the exception instead of the rule.”

He said those receiving money will just count it as additional revenue to the operation, thus contributing to the profit and loss statement: “It should benefit the producers who receive payment, but it will also prop up less efficient producers. The desired signal for less efficient producers is to improve efficiency, and government payments do not send that signal.”

Similar to the Farmer Bridge Assistance (FBA) program, the HFR program will provide simple, proportional support to producers using a uniform formula to cover a portion of modeled losses during the 2026 crop year, the USDA said.

The agency added that this national loss average will be based on FSA-reported planted acres, Economic Research Service cost of production estimates, and World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates yields and prices.

Scott Metzger, American Soybean Association president and Williamsport, Ohio, farmer, said in an Oct. 27 statement to Farm World: “We appreciate this additional assistance as farmers continue to navigate high input costs and challenging market conditions.”

While federal crop insurance will not be required for participation in the HFR program, the USDA said it is strongly urging U.S. producers to take advantage of the enhanced risk management tools included in the Working Families Tax Cuts Act to best protect against price risk and volatility in the future.

Enacted on July 4, 2025, the Working Families Tax Cuts Act represents one of the largest financial investments in American agriculture and farm safety nets in decades, the USDA said. Earlier this year, the FBA program delivered $12 billion in one-time bridge payments to over 560,000 farmers across the country, according to the USDA.

In October, nearly $14 billion in gross payments were provided to producers through the Agriculture Risk Coverage and Price Loss Coverage programs through the Working Families Tax Cuts Act, the agency said.

For more information on the USDA’s Harvest Fuel Relief Program and payment eligibility, e-mail questions to HarvestFuel@usda.gov, or visit: www.usda.gov.