Sources and Methods
Each claim on this site links to the USDA notice, handbook, regulation, statute or data behind it. Where we did arithmetic, the table and the method are here, with a download of the numbers.
The national average price per mile to haul a truckload of feed or livestock, set by FSA for each program year under 7 CFR 1416.110(o).
| Program year | Rate | Where USDA published it |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | $6.60 | FSA news release, Sept. 8, 2021 ("initial cost formula of $6.60 per mile") |
| 2022 | $6.44 | Notice ELAP-11 |
| 2023 | $6.60 | Notice ELAP-15 |
| 2024 | $6.60 | Handbook 1-ELAP (Rev. 1) Amendment 2, paragraph 110 A. No ELAP notice published a 2024 rate. |
| 2025 | $3.50 | Notice ELAP-25, Part 2 C ("$3.50 per mile per truckload for 2025") |
| 2026 | $3.75 | Notice ELAP-27, Part 2 C |
From $6.60 to $3.50 is a 47.0 percent cut. $3.75 is 43.2 percent below $6.60. The water hauling rate moved the other way, from $0.07 a gallon (2021 to 2023, Notice ELAP-15) to $0.10 (Notice ELAP-25) and $0.11 (Notice ELAP-27), up 57.1 percent.
The rate is not what a producer is paid per mile. The payment is the rate times a national payment factor (60 percent, or 90 percent for eligible underserved producers per 7 CFR 1416.109(a) and Notice ELAP-15), times additional miles above normal, excluding the first 25 miles and capped at 1,000 miles per truckload (7 CFR 1416.110(n); 1416.103(d)(6)), limited from 2024 on to the truckloads the feed cap allows (1416.110(q)).
From 90 FR 5494: "Forage or hay requirements for an adult beef cow are approximately 24 pounds of dry hay matter per day, or approximately 26 pounds of hay with 8 percent moisture. To allow for a reasonable variation in the amount of feed consumed by eligible livestock, FSA will multiply the number of animal units by 24 pounds of corn or corn equivalent (equal to 15.7 pounds multiplied by 150 percent, rounded up to the nearest pound) or 39 pounds of hay or forage (equal to 26 pounds of hay multiplied by 150 percent)." The figure is then multiplied by the days from the start of the drought to the end of the program year.
The rule's footnote 9 for the 26 pound figure points to an Ohio State University web article. Notice ELAP-21 attributes the same figure to "research from Oklahoma State University."
This case study shows how the national LFP formula performed against Oklahoma hay and trucking costs. It is an estimate for one state, not a finding for every state or any single ranch. Results will vary by state, region, forage type, distance and local market.
| Year | LFP monthly feed cost | LFP paid (60%) | OK other hay, $/ton | Freight, $/ton, 100 mi | Delivered hay, per cow month | LFP share |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | $31.18 | $18.71 | $106.42 | $33.00 | $71.05 | 26% |
| 2022 | $47.29 | $28.37 | $108.00 | $32.20 | $71.45 | 40% |
| 2023 | $58.12 | $34.87 | $113.50 | $33.00 | $74.67 | 47% |
| 2024 | $52.56 | $31.54 | $97.58 | $33.00 | $66.55 | 47% |
| 2025 | $41.40 | $24.84 | $90.75 | $17.50 | $55.17 | 45% |
| 2026 | $35.66 | $21.40 | $83.57 | $18.75 | $52.15 | 41% |
Method. Hay need per cow month: 26 pounds of dry matter a day, divided by 0.88 for the moisture in hay, plus 15 percent feeding loss, times 30 days (0.51 ton). Hay price: the annual average of NASS monthly Oklahoma "other hay" prices from Agricultural Prices; 2026 averages the months published through the July 2026 report. Freight: USDA's own ELAP feed hauling rate for the year, times 100 miles, spread over a 20 ton load. LFP paid: 60 percent of the monthly feed cost listed above. The comparison is per qualifying month and leaves out labor, equipment and the first-month timing of any trigger.
Download the case study table (CSV)
Our Drought Monitor research is open. The site does not state any conclusion about the Monitor's accuracy.
The source of the totals in the Friends of RGS statement on the home page.
| Federal fiscal year | LFP (AL 10.109) | ELAP (AL 10.110) | Both |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | $1,128,057,740 | $234,401,070 | $1,362,458,810 |
| 2023 | $1,566,025,801 | $304,480,356 | $1,870,506,157 |
| 2024 | $909,277,805 | $348,854,731 | $1,258,132,536 |
| 2025 | $658,978,772 | $625,587,394 | $1,284,566,166 |
| Total | $4,262,340,118 | $1,513,323,551 | $5,775,663,669 |
How to reproduce it: on USAspending.gov Advanced Search, filter Assistance Listing 10.109 (Livestock Forage Disaster Program) or 10.110 (Emergency Assistance for Livestock, Honeybees and Farm-raised Fish), one federal fiscal year at a time (October 1 to September 30), then view Spending by Geography with location type "place of performance" at the state level. Each total above is the sum of all 50 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. territories. Retrieved October 10, 2026 through the USAspending API (spending_by_geography). USAspending revises records over time, so a later retrieval may differ slightly.
Limits: ELAP figures include every kind of ELAP loss (livestock feed and water hauling, grazing, dairy, honeybees, farm-raised fish and others), not only feed hauling. Fiscal year follows when the payment was recorded, not the program year of the loss.
Download the national totals (CSV) · Every state (CSV)
When someone picks a state on the home page, the card shows that state's figures from this table.
Limits: ELAP figures include every kind of ELAP loss, not only feed and water hauling. In some states other ELAP losses make up most of the total: California's is mostly dairy losses, and Louisiana's is largely farm-raised fish. Where a state's ELAP is larger than its LFP, the card does not compare the two. LFP and ELAP pay for different losses, so the comparison shows how much of each reached a state, not what any producer was owed. Where a state received less than $1 million in LFP, the card shows national figures instead. Fiscal year figures follow when USAspending records the payment, so they do not match program year totals elsewhere on this page.
| Federal fiscal year | ELAP award records | LFP award records | LFP records per ELAP record |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 17,684 | 158,318 | 9.0 |
| 2023 | 22,002 | 204,190 | 9.3 |
| 2024 | 16,483 | 126,964 | 7.7 |
| 2025 | 12,027 | 100,057 | 8.3 |
Method. Direct payment award counts from USAspending.gov for Assistance Listing 10.110 (ELAP) and 10.109 (LFP), by federal fiscal year (October 1 to September 30), retrieved October 10, 2026. To repeat it: on USAspending.gov Award Search, set Time Period to the fiscal year, set Assistance Listing to 10.110 or 10.109, and read the Direct Payments count. The same count comes from the public API endpoint /api/v2/search/spending_by_award_count/ with those two filters. Limits: award records are not individual producers; one producer can have several. These are national counts, not counts for the same counties or the same producers, so they do not show that any particular LFP recipient was also eligible for ELAP. The ELAP count covers every kind of ELAP loss, not only feed hauling.
| Calendar year | Counties meeting the test | Qualifying county weeks |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 43 | 322 |
| 2022 | 77 | 2,947 |
| 2023 | 74 | 1,733 |
| 2024 | 62 | 488 |
| 2025 | 27 | 143 |
| 2026, through July 21 | 64 | 1,047 |
Method. All 77 Oklahoma counties across 291 weekly U.S. Drought Monitor maps (valid December 29, 2020 through July 21, 2026). A county week counts when the county has D2 in any part of the county for at least 8 consecutive weeks, or any D3 or D4. A category counts as present in any area above 0.00 percent coverage. Weeks are grouped by the map's valid date. This is our reconstruction from the public data, not FSA's eligibility determination of record.
| Program year | Total paid | Payment records | Distinct payee names | Paid in calendar year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | $304,117 | 65 | 62 | 2021: $24,821 · 2022: $229,106 · 2023: $50,190 |
| 2022 | $31,146,200 | 4,112 | 3,813 | 2022: $6.46M · 2023: $24.52M · 2024 and 2025: $0.17M |
| 2023 | $31,499,236 | 1,912 | 1,612 | 2023: $22.00M · 2024: $9.46M · 2025: $0.04M |
| 2024, through calendar 2025 files | $49,353,346 | 1,371 | 978 | 2024: $25.94M · 2025: $23.41M |
| 2025, incomplete | $230,036 | 46 | 45 | 2025: $0.23M |
Method and definitions. From the FSA payment files for calendar years 2021 to 2025, accounting program code 2833 (ELAP), Oklahoma only: 7,506 disbursement records, each grouped by the program year FSA recorded on it.
18 counties received more than $250,000 in LFP payments (code 2835) in calendar years 2022 to 2025 and no ELAP payments of any kind (code 2833). An LFP payment shows that USDA's own drought trigger was met in the county. Zero ELAP does not by itself show whether ranchers applied and were denied, or never applied; only FSA's application records can separate the two.
| State | County | LFP paid, CY2022 to 2025 | ELAP paid |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kansas | Comanche | $426,905 | $0 |
| Kansas | Douglas | $309,131 | $0 |
| Kansas | Leavenworth | $434,336 | $0 |
| Kansas | Morton | $2,913,405 | $0 |
| Kansas | Stafford | $6,880,332 | $0 |
| Kansas | Stanton | $709,674 | $0 |
| Missouri | Butler | $323,540 | $0 |
| Missouri | Carter | $489,097 | $0 |
| Missouri | Clay | $1,013,245 | $0 |
| Missouri | Knox | $1,865,758 | $0 |
| Missouri | Marion | $894,382 | $0 |
| Missouri | Perry | $1,283,863 | $0 |
| Missouri | Platte | $714,011 | $0 |
| Missouri | Scotland | $1,377,003 | $0 |
| Missouri | Scott | $310,532 | $0 |
| Missouri | Ste. Genevieve | $1,001,822 | $0 |
| Missouri | Stoddard | $394,533 | $0 |
| Missouri | Wayne | $768,527 | $0 |
Method. The regional FSA payment files per calendar year, 2022 to 2025, accounting program codes 2833 (ELAP), 2835 (LFP) and 2943 (ELRP), summed by county. Counties with $250,000 or less in LFP are left out. Calendar years of disbursement, not program years. The county is the county recorded in the payment file, which is the administrative county of record and not necessarily where every acre of grass lies. Where ranchers grow more of their own hay and haul less, some of the difference may be real economics rather than administration.
USDA's own figures for federal crop insurance in 2024, from the Economic Research Service page Risk Management: Crop Insurance at a Glance (updated Sept. 23, 2025):
| 2024 | Figure | ERS wording |
|---|---|---|
| Acreage of eight major field crops enrolled in federal crop insurance | about 89% | "roughly 89 percent of acreage of eight major U.S. field crops (barley, corn, cotton, oats, rice, sorghum, soybeans, and wheat) were enrolled in FCIP" |
| Row crops' share of insured liability | 65% | "row crops which represent 65 percent of insured liability in 2024" |
| Forage crops' share of insured liability | 4% | "represented only 4 percent of total liability in 2024" |
| Federal premium subsidies | $10.4 billion | "Premium subsidies totaled $10.4 billion for 2024." |
The same page notes that forage crops made up 56 percent of insured acreage in 2024, largely through Pasture, Rangeland, and Forage coverage, but only 4 percent of liability because of their low insured value per acre.
No public USDA source reports how many producers applied for ELAP, were approved, were reduced or were denied, at any level. The payment files show only who was paid. Feed transportation is not separated from other ELAP payments. Producers who were never told about a program leave no trace in any of it. That is why the record ranchers put on this site matters.