{"id":6384,"date":"2022-04-12T11:21:58","date_gmt":"2022-04-12T21:21:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/?p=6384"},"modified":"2026-05-01T13:48:54","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T23:48:54","slug":"news-release-agriculture-secretary-declares-drought-disaster-affecting-maui-and-hawaii-counties-allowing-emergency-farm-loans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/news-release-agriculture-secretary-declares-drought-disaster-affecting-maui-and-hawaii-counties-allowing-emergency-farm-loans\/","title":{"rendered":"NEWS RELEASE: Agriculture Secretary Declares Drought Disaster Affecting Maui And Hawai\u2018I Counties, Allowing Emergency Farm Loans"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tuesday, April 12, 2022<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Release No. 2022-019<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>HONOLULU<\/strong> \u2013 The United States Department of Agriculture has designated Maui County and Hawai\u2018i County as primary natural disaster areas as a result of drought, making farm operators in those counties eligible for emergency loans and other Farm Service Agency assistance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Thomas Vilsack announced the designation in an April 8, 2022, letter to Gov. David Ige. The most recent <a href=\"https:\/\/droughtmonitor.unl.edu\/CurrentMap\/StateDroughtMonitor.aspx?HI\">U.S. Drought Monitor report<\/a> showed both counties had areas that are experiencing extreme drought during the farm growing season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The deadline to apply for the emergency drought loans is December 8, 2022, eight months from the date of the declaration. Farmers may <a href=\"https:\/\/offices.sc.egov.usda.gov\/locator\/app?state=hi&amp;agency=fsa\">contact their local Farm Service Agency office<\/a> for additional information on assistance that may be available to eligible applicants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cFSA considers each emergency loan application on its own merits, taking into account the extent of production losses on the farm and the security and repayment ability of the operator,\u201d Secretary Vilsack said in the letter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The persistent drought had already led to a State of Hawai\u2018i <a href=\"https:\/\/governor.hawaii.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/2203087-ATG_Proclamation-Relating-to-Axis-Deer-distribution-signed.pdf\">disaster declaration<\/a> for Maui County related to axis deer, which have proliferated on the island and moved from their normal foraging grounds into agricultural and populated areas as they dry weather withers their usual food sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\"># # #<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Contact:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Adam Weintraub<br>Communication Director<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">adam.b.weintraub@hawaii.gov<br>808-620-5417<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tuesday, April 12, 2022 Release No. 2022-019 HONOLULU \u2013 The United States Department of Agriculture has designated Maui County and Hawai\u2018i County as primary natural disaster areas as a result [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":126,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"7116,6881,7391,5370,6873,7170","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[354,351],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-354","category-news-release"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/126"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6384"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6384\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15564,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6384\/revisions\/15564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dod.hawaii.gov\/hiema\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}