The Farm Service Agency announced this week that Milk Income Loss Contract (MILC) payments are being processed. The Deficit Reduction Act passed late last year extended the MILC program to September of 2007, providing a dairy with a monthly payment equal to the milk quantity sold in that month multiplied by 34% of the difference between $16.94/cwt and the month’s Class I price. Operations are eligible for payments up to 2.4 million pounds of milk produced and marketed per dairy per fiscal year. The current sign-up phase will expire May 17th for the ’06-’07 fiscal years.