The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) this week announced plans to purchase chicken leg quarters for surplus removal. A solicitation will be issued in the near future, but more information is available on AMS’ website by clicking here.
“Members of the National Chicken Council are most appreciative of USDA’s timely action that was in response to NCC’s request. The purchase of leg quarters will not only help stabilize the prices for this product but will provide a very preferred animal protein to needy recipients in the coming months. NCC is grateful to the many department employees who worked diligently to have the request turned around in a timely manner,” said NCC President Mike Brown in response to the USDA announcement. “More importantly, providing much needed animal protein to financially-stressed families, group feeding kitchens, disaster-relief operations, and other federal feeding programs is a most worthy measure.”
Previous special purchase programs by the USDA have been supported by a number of hunger groups and have also received a most grateful response from the recipients.
Brown noted that, with the on-going and very significant disruption to the U.S. chicken export market this year, the likelihood is that the build-up of leg quarters in cold storage will continue to mount. Even before the current avian influenza outbreak that has resulted in more than 40 important export markets restricting to some extent the importation of U.S. leg quarters, the export market had been experiencing little growth. A combination of political decisions by certain foreign governments; a stronger U.S. currency; a significant decrease in global oil revenues; and other factors has compounded the avian influenza trade restrictions and import bans.
Also this week, AMS announced plans to purchase oven roasted chicken for the school lunch program. More information is available here.
AMS purchases a variety of domestically produced and processed commodity food products, through a competitive process among approved vendors. These purchase activities support American agriculture by providing an outlet for surplus products and encouraging domestic consumption of domestic foods. The wholesome, high quality products, collectively called USDA Foods, are delivered to schools, food banks, and households in communities across the country and are a vital component of our nation’s food safety net.
