Deadline: 11-Apr-22
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), Rural Development (RD) Rural Business-Cooperative Service (RBCS or Agency), requests applications for the Meat and Poultry Processing Expansion Program (MPPEP).
Pursuant to this authority, USDA is making grant funding available to meat and poultry processors for start-up and expansion. This will promote competition and give more and better options to producers by increasing meat and poultry processing capacity. Separately, USDA is using the same authority to increase available capital through loan guarantees and intermediary relending. The grants in MPPEP can finance no more than $25M or 20% of the project costs and requires the grantee to demonstrate committed project financing.
Purpose
The primary goal of the MPPEP is to provide more and better processing options to producers as soon as possible. The secondary goals relate to the strategies to fulfill the primary goal and make lasting impacts, and include:
- to increase shackle space available to producers;
- to support development of value-added products available to consumers;
- to support proposals that provide fair prices, fair wages and new and safe job opportunities that keep profits circulating in the rural community; and
- to increase diversity in processing options in terms of business model approaches, geography, and availability to underserved communities.
Funding Information
- Approximately $150 million is available to fund projects.
- The maximum period of performance for this grant is 48 months.
Eligible Applicants
- Eligible applicants, which include an individual sole proprietor business and other business entities, must engage or propose to engage in meat and poultry processing which will expand capacity in the sector. Entities are eligible regardless of legal structure and may include, but are not limited to, federally recognized tribes, tribal entities, for-profit entities, corporations, non-profit entities, producer-owned cooperatives and corporations, certified benefit corporations, and State or local government entities.
- Private entities must be independently owned and operated. All entities must be domestically owned, and their meat and poultry processing facilities (existing or planned) must be physically located and operated within the U.S. or its territories.
- Eligible applicants must process or plan to process one or more species subject to the Federal Meat Inspection Act (FMIA) or the Poultry Product Inspection Act (PPIA) and possess or plan to obtain a Federal Grant of Inspection, a grant of inspection under a Cooperative Interstate Shipment Program, or a tribal or state meat and poultry inspection program with standards at least equal to Federal inspection at the time of application. Plants processing non-amenable species under voluntary Food Safety and Inspection Service inspection are also eligible to apply for funding.
For more information, visit https://www.grants.gov/web/grants/view-opportunity.html?oppId=338342
