$5 billion coronavirus relief bill allocated to Black farmers to pay off debt

Black farmers have been allocated $5 billion inside President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill.

Farmers nationwide who were struggling before the coronavirus pandemic due to trade wars incited by Donald Trump were allocated $10.4 billion by the American Rescue Plan. Half of the amount will go to Black farmers.

Head of the National Black Farmers Association John Boyd told Yahoo News that Black farmers are literally going extinct.

“We’re quite frankly, faced with extinction. If we can’t get a new generation of young people involved in agriculture and farming, Blacks and other farmers of color into farming, you won’t see it,” Boyd said.

Both White and Black farmers face similar farming challenges, according to the Associated Press. However, Black farmers face more challenges, especially in accessing credit and technical support which makes it more difficult for them to have updated equipment, effectively operate their land, or even buy more land. There have also been series of racial bias which have caused Black farmers to be kicked off their lands by the government.

According to Boyd, at the turn of the century, there were over one million Black farmers, compared to the less than 50,000 today.

While the $5 billion allocation is only a fraction of the $1.9 trillion bill, advocates say that it is the right step towards bettering the Black farmers’ community after a century of mistreatment by the government. Other advocates say it is a form of compensation for racial oppression committed against African Americans.

“This is the most significant piece of legislation with respect to the arc of Black land ownership in this country,” said Tracy Lloyd McCurty, executive director of the Black Belt Justice Center, an agency that provides legal representation to Black farmers.

Over the past century, Black farmers in America have lost more than 12 million acres of land. It is a result of systemic racism and biased government policy, according to agricultural experts and advocates for Black farmers. Black farmers have been denied equitable access to markets over the years.

This racial discrimination started a century ago, following a series of Homestead Acts that mainly offered White settlers highly subsidized lands. Since then, the United States Department of Agriculture has relatively denied Black farmers access to credit and deliberately ignore or delay Black farmers’ loan applications. This has brought several challenges to Black farmers who cannot access certain USDA loans because they do not have clear claims to their land.

“For generations, socially disadvantaged farmers have struggled to fully succeed due to systemic discrimination and a cycle of debt,” said Tom Vilsack, Agricultural Secretary, in a statement on Saturday. “On top of the economic pain caused by the pandemic, farmers from socially disadvantaged communities are dealing with a disproportionate share of Covid-19 infection rates, hospitalizations, death and economic hurt.”

According to the US Department of Agriculture, of the 3.4 million farmers in the United States, only 45,000 are Black. Black farm ownership in 1910 rose to 16 to 19 million acres, about 14% of the total agricultural land. A century later, 90% of Black-owned agricultural lands have been lost. While white farmers account for 98% of the total agricultural land, today.