Both of Iowa’s Senators and other agricultural leaders have written to USDA this week requesting Coronavirus Food Assistance Program funding help for the state’s turkey growers. Iowa is 7th. In the nation in turkey production and fifth in turkey processing. Iowa Turkey Federation Executive Director Gretta Irwin says the COVID pandemic has caused a loss in sales to restaurants serving turkey and caused a backlog of turkeys that would have been processed.

She says the biggest help turkey producers could receive would be from CFAP funding.

Irwin says federal funding is a critical need for the state’s growers as well as for the processors hit hard by the pandemic.

In their letter to the USDA, Iowa officials ask that economists at the USDA work to devise a methodology and formula that allows this niche sector of the nation’s poultry industry to get the help they need.