Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin ordered the government on Friday to subsidize interest rates on loans to farmers who are struggling to cope with the summer's drought.
The government will allocate 2.6 billion rubles ($85 million) for the program this year and a further 7.9 billion rubles ($258 million) in 2011, he said at a cabinet meeting.
First Deputy Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov said additional measures to support the stricken farmers are being considered.
The government will start selling the grain from the intervention fund when the need arises, he said.
Russia has a long history of using the intervention fund, which has an estimated 10 million tons of grain, as a safety net at times of droughts.
A quarter of this year's harvest has been destroyed by one of the worst droughts in the country's history, forcing the government to ban grain exports until the end of the year and reducing grain forecasts to as low as 60 million tons - 38 percent less than last year.
MOSCOW, August 20 (RIA Novosti)
