The Department of Agriculture will launch a third round of Farmers to Families Food Box Program purchases in September. The purchases will spend the balance of $3 billion authorized for the program.
So far, over 46 million Farmers to Families Food Boxes have been invoiced and delivered. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue says the program “is accomplishing what we intended – supporting U.S. farmers and distributors and getting food to those who need it most.”
In the third round of purchases, USDA plans to purchase combination boxes to ensure all recipient organizations have access to fresh produce, dairy products, fluid milk, and meat products. In the ongoing second round of purchasing and distribution, which began July 1, USDA aims to purchase up to $1.47 billion of food for the program.
For the second round, USDA extended contracts of select vendors from the first round of the program worth up to $1.27 billion. The first round of purchases totaled more than $947 million from May 15 through June 30, 2020.
