Arkansas to receive $286M in American Relief Act aid with Mississippi County having the largest number of eligible acres

By Mary Hightower

U of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Arkansas agriculture will receive $286.2 million in assistance from the American Relief Act, with Mississippi County being the top recipient, according to an analysis by the Rural & Farm Finance Policy Analysis Center.

The American Relief Act was the continuing resolution passed in December to keep the federal government open through March 14. It also extended the 2018 Farm Bill through September 2025. In total, it provides $10 billion in economic assistance to crop farmers growing eight commodities: barley, corn, cotton, oats, peanuts, rice, sorghum, soybeans and wheat.

Six million of the state’s acres were determined to be eligible for economic assistance. Soybeans comprised more than half of that acreage — 51 percent. Rice covered 26 percent, cotton, 11 percent and corn 10 percent. The remaining acreage was in oats, peanuts, grain sorghum and winter wheat.

The economic loss from each crop is determined as the difference between the 2024 expected cost of production per acre published by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service and the 2024 expected gross return per acre.

Hunter Biram, extension economist for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture, said the top five crops receiving assistance in Arkansas are rice, soybeans, cotton, corn, and peanuts accounting for 37 percent, 31 percent, 20 percent, 9 percent, and 1 percent, respectively, of the $286.2 million in total assistance. Wheat, sorghum, and oats, account for 2 percent of total assistance.

The dollar total for rice was approximately $106.6 million; $89.8 million for soybeans, $56.3 million for cotton, $25.8 million for corn, $3.32 million for peanuts, $3.29 million for wheat, $650,200 for sorghum and $394,900 for oats.

“The top five counties receiving assistance are Mississippi, Craighead, Poinsett, Phillips and Clay counties,” Biram said.

Mississippi County received 8 percent of the aid, or about $23.1 million; Craighead and neighboring Poinsett County each received 6 percent and Phillips and Clay counties each received 5 percent.

Mississippi had the largest number of eligible acres at 463,850. Ouachita County had the fewest acres — 5 — all of which were in corn.

Biram notes that “these payments are not directly a function of weather and are based on current plantings relative to historical price and production data.”

The Rural and Farm Finance Policy Analysis Center is based at the University of Missouri. The policy brief was written by Alejandro Plastina of RaFF; Biram; Ryan Loy, extension economist for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture; and Marc Rosenbohm of the Food and Agricultural Research Institute, University of Missouri.

To learn about extension programs in Arkansas, contact your local Cooperative Extension Service agent or visit www.uaex.uada.edu. Follow us on X and Instagram at @AR_Extension. To learn more about Division of Agriculture research, visit the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station website: https://aaes.uada.edu. Follow on X at @ArkAgResearch. To learn more about the Division of Agriculture, visit https://uada.edu/. Follow us on X at @AgInArk.