Application means the Asparagus Revenue Market Loss Assistance Payment Program application form approved for use in this program by CCC and any required accompanying information or documentation.

Application period means the 60-day period established by the Deputy Administrator for producers to apply for the Asparagus Revenue Marketing Loss Assistance Payment Program.

Asparagus producer means any individual, group of individuals, partnership, corporation, estate, trust, association, cooperative, or other business enterprise or other legal entity, as defined in § 1400.3 of this chapter, who is an owner, operator, landlord, tenant, or sharecropper, who directly or indirectly, as determined by the Secretary, shares in the risk of producing asparagus and who is entitled to ownership share in the asparagus crop available for marketing from the farm operation. Growers producing asparagus under contract for crop owners are not considered asparagus producers unless the grower can be determined to have an ownership share of the crop.

Base period means the 2003 crop year of asparagus.

County office means the FSA office responsible for administering CCC programs located in a specific area in a State.

Crop year means the marketing season or year as defined by the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS).

Department or USDA means the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Determined production means, with respect to the base period, the total amount of fresh and processed asparagus specified on the application for payment verified by CCC as having been produced and marketed by the producer in the base period.

Farm Service Agency or FSA means the Farm Service Agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Fresh asparagus means domestically-produced asparagus that, regardless of intended use, was marketed as a fresh product without any processing other than cleaning, grading, sorting, trimming, drying, cooling, and packing.

Hundredweight or cwt. means 100 pounds.

Processed asparagus means domestically-produced asparagus that, regardless of intended use, was marketed as frozen, canned, pickled, or otherwise treated or handled in such fashion that the buyer would not consider the asparagus to be consumed as fresh, as determined by CCC.

Reliable production records means evidence provided by the producer to the FSA county office that FSA determines is adequate to substantiate the amount of production reported when verifiable records are not available, including copies of receipts, ledgers of income, income statements, deposit slips, register tapes, invoices for custom harvesting, records to verify production costs, contemporaneous measurements, truck scale tickets, and contemporaneous diaries. When the term “acceptable production records” is used in this rule, it may be either reliable or verifiable production records, as defined in this section.

Reported production means the total amount of fresh and processed asparagus produced and marketed by a producer, as specified by a producer on the application for payment.

United States means the 50 States of the United States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

Verifiable production records means evidence that is used to substantiate the amount of production reported and that can be verified by FSA through an independent source.