$71.7 million in loan assistance to help rural businesses

by S. C.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced $71.7 million in loan guarantees to assist 20 rural businesses in funding made available by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The funding announced today is being made available through USDA Rural Development's Business and Industry Guaranteed Loan Program. Altogether, $1.7 billion is available to businesses across the country through Recovery Act Business and Industry Guaranteed Loan Program funding.

"The Recovery Act funds announced today will help businesses get access to the capital they need to launch and expand their businesses and help bring additional jobs to America's small cities and towns," Vilsack said. "President Obama and I are committed to building strong rural communities by helping businesses grow so we can put people back to work."

For example, in Georgetown, S.C., USDA Rural Development is guaranteeing a $3 million loan to enable a local gate and mounting-system company to restructure debt and purchase new machinery and equipment.

In Franklin County, Ohio, a farmer owned cooperative with local headquarters was selected to receive a $7.5 million loan guarantee. The loan will help provide business services to more than 50,000 livestock farmers in Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. The Business and Industry loan will help the cooperative continue to maintain health insurance to its nearly 500 employees, many of whom live in counties with unemployment rates 125 percent greater than the national average and counties that have been affected recently by natural disasters.

Eligible Business and Industry Loan Program applicants include private businesses, cooperative organizations, corporations, partnerships, non-profit groups, federally recognized Indian tribes, public bodies and individuals. The funds will be targeted to creating and retaining quality jobs and serving difficult-to-reach populations and areas hardest hit by the current economic downturn.