USDA Announces Final Programmatic Environmental Assessment and Finding of No Significant Impact for the Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure Program

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) today announced the availability of a final Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA) and Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) for the Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure (RFSI) program. The final PEA analyzes and discloses the potential environmental impacts associated with the establishment of the RFSI program.

Based on the analysis conducted by USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) under the final PEA, USDA has determined there will not be a significant impact to the human environment. As a result, AMS has prepared a FONSI and will not prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).

AMS intends for this PEA to establish a framework that will make any future assessments more efficient by placing project-specific actions that may need more analysis into priority tiers. As decisions on specific applications are made, if additional National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) analysis is required, the agency will conduct an environmental review to supplement the analysis set forth in this PEA.

A Notice of Availability of the final PEA and FONSI is available for viewing in the Federal Register. For more information about the RFSI program or to view the final PEA and FONSI, visit the RFSI Webpage.

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