USDA is preparing to fund the second round of payments under the 2019 Market Facilitation Program as early as late November or early December, but Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue is hopeful a third round won't be needed.

A House stopgap spending bill aimed at avoiding an Oct. 1 government shutdown would ensure that trade assistance to farmers continues and also would bolster specialty crop research and fund USDA’s coming hemp program.

Under pressure from rural lawmakers, House Democratic leaders are expected to ensure USDA can continue making trade assistance payments to farmers after the new fiscal year starts Oct. 1.

The Agriculture Department sharply increased commodity payment rates for its 2019 trade assistance package, boosting the corn rate by 14-fold and quadrupling cotton’s, based on higher estimates of the trade damage that farmers have suffered.

When the Department of Agriculture changed the way it distributed Market Facilitation Program payments for the 2019 edition of the program, it also changed where a good chunk of the payments were going.

Qualifying producers will get payments ranging from $15 to $150 an acre under this year's version of the Market Facilitation Program, with rates varying widely by county and region.

Farmers who qualify for the upcoming round of trade assistance payments will get at least $15 an acre, says Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, who will release additional details of the Market Facilitation Program later in the week.

The White House Office of Management and Budget has finished its review of trade mitigation payments to the nation's producers hit by a trade war with China.