The Nation - News from Dec. 21, 1988

The Farmers Home Administration, which makes loans to struggling farmers, has accumulated losses of at least $36 billion, a federal audit showed, according to a published report. The General Accounting Office said the agency would be “unable to meet its outstanding debt obligations without additional borrowings or congressional appropriations,” the New York Times reported in today’s editions. The agency was created more than 40 years ago to provide low-interest loans for farmers who have difficulty finding credit in the private sector. The GAO audit, the first in the agency’s history, found that the agency had liabilities of about $91 billion, but the value of its outstanding loans was about $55 billion for the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, 1987.