Farmers Rice Milling Company will supply fortified long-grain rice for federal food-assistance programs under a contract scheduled to run through mid-November. Public procurement records show the Lake Charles mill has received roughly $9 million in similar USDA rice contracts during 2026.

LAKE CHARLES, La. — Farmers Rice Milling Company has received a $2,653,030 federal contract to supply fortified rice for U.S. government food-donation programs, adding another multimillion-dollar award to the Lake Charles mill’s long-running relationship with the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The contract, 121NTP26C0180, was awarded Sept. 2 and is funded through USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service, with the Agricultural Marketing Service handling the procurement. Federal records list the place of performance as Lake Charles and an ultimate completion date of Nov. 15, 2026.

The award was made as a firm-fixed-price contract following a sealed-bid procurement. Federal contract data shows 15 offers were received and identifies the procurement as a partial small-business set-aside.

The underlying USDA solicitation sought oil, dry beans, fortified milled rice, peas, lentils and corn-soy blend products for international food-assistance programs. Bids closed Sept. 1, one day before the Farmers Rice contract was awarded.

What Lake Charles is supplying

The federal description for the Farmers Rice award identifies the product as:

“RICE, 5/20 LG, W-MLD, FORT BAG-50 KG.”

In practical terms, the contract covers fortified white-milled long-grain rice packaged in 50-kilogram bags.

USDA's specifications for fortified milled rice allow long- or medium-grain rice and include a specification for U.S. No. 5 or better rice with no more than 20% broken kernels. The finished product is blended with fortified rice kernels containing micronutrients while remaining usable with normal rice preparation and cooking methods.

Those federal specifications include nutrients such as vitamin A, several B vitamins, folic acid, iron and zinc. USDA requires the fortified kernels to be blended throughout the conventional milled rice rather than requiring food-assistance recipients to add nutrients separately.

USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service purchases American agricultural commodities through competitive procurements and works with the Foreign Agricultural Service and State Department on international programs including Food for Progress, McGovern-Dole Food for Education and other food-assistance programs.

The publicly available records reviewed by 337.NEWS identify the September purchase broadly as a U.S. government food-donation contract. They do not identify a specific recipient country or individual food-assistance program for this shipment.

Nearly $9 million in 2026 contracts

The September award is not an isolated federal purchase.

Public procurement records show Farmers Rice Milling has received at least five other USDA contracts for similar fortified rice during 2026.

Among them were approximately $894,000 under contract 121NTP26C0019, $303,048 in April, $3.53 million in May, another $843,163 later in May and $769,433 in June.

Adding the new $2.653 million contract brings those six identified 2026 awards to approximately $9 million.

The repeated awards also show that federal food procurement is not a new line of business for the Lake Charles operation.

Farmers Rice says USDA has been its largest customer for more than 50 years. The company says its mill processes more than 700 million pounds of rice annually, with much of its production historically serving bulk and export markets.

The company was established in 1917 and describes its Lake Charles facility as Louisiana's largest rice mill. Its production serves domestic customers as well as international markets.

That characterization has also appeared outside the company's own marketing. In an April 2026 Louisiana Third Circuit Court of Appeal decision involving Farmers Rice and the Port of Lake Charles, the court described Farmers Rice as “the largest rice mill in Louisiana” and noted that the company uses the port to ship rice products.

A federal contract with a local supply chain

Although the federal government is ultimately buying the finished rice, the contract begins with an agricultural and industrial operation based in Southwest Louisiana.

Farmers Rice operates at 3211 Highway 397 in Lake Charles, in the middle of one of Louisiana's traditional rice-producing regions. The company says it sources rice from farming operations and processes it locally before serving domestic and export customers.

USDA requires vendors participating in its commodity procurement system to provide domestically produced and processed agricultural products. The agency says its procurement program purchases between $2 billion and $5 billion of American agricultural products annually, supplying both domestic nutrition programs and international humanitarian food assistance.

For Farmers Rice Milling, the September contract continues a federal purchasing relationship that predates most of the modern USDA food-aid procurement system.

For Southwest Louisiana, it also represents another example of federal contract spending flowing through a local company without involving a military installation, highway project or construction contractor — in this case through one of the region's oldest agricultural industries.

About the Author

Dalton Barron is an investigative reporter and Louisiana-licensed real estate salesperson affiliated with NextHome Bayou Pines.

His reporting focuses on public records, real estate, development, infrastructure, business, government, and local data across Southwest Louisiana.

Dalton Barron
NextHome Bayou Pines
Jeremy Jones, Broker/Owner
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DeRidder, LA 70634

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Dalton’s real estate activities are separate from the editorial operations of 337.NEWS. The brokerage information above is included for transparency where reporting may intersect with real estate, development, property ownership, land use, infrastructure, or related industries.

About 337.NEWS

337.NEWS is an independent Southwest Louisiana publication covering real estate, public records, development, infrastructure, business and local government.

The goal is to look past the headline and into the contracts, filings, data and documents underneath it.

Sometimes that means following a multimillion-dollar federal award. Sometimes it means tracing a parcel, a road project, a development proposal or a public expenditure.

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