The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Risk Management Agency (RMA) as we speak introduced it can make a number of enhancements to Federal crop insurance coverage prevented planting protection. RMA will implement these adjustments for many spring crops with prevented planting protection, beginning within the 2021 crop yr, and for all crops with prevented planting protection, beginning within the 2022 crop yr.
“After unprecedented prevented planting in 2019, I thought it was incredibly important to examine how prevented planting policy can be improved,” mentioned RMA Administrator Martin Barbre. “Over the past few months, RMA has engaged producer groups, insurance agents, and Approved Insurance Providers in discussion through a prevented planting taskforce with the goal to improve prevented planting for producers when they really need it, but not to incentivize it.”
The adjustments embrace:
- Expansion of the “1 in 4” requirement nationwide. Currently, solely producers within the Prairie Pothole National Priority Area are topic to the requirement, which requires producers to plant acreage in a minimum of one of many 4 most up-to-date crop years to be eligible for prevented planting protection on these acres.
- Several modifications to current coverage and process to make sure that producers’ prevented planting funds adequately mirror the crops the producer meant to plant. Specific data on the adjustments could be discovered right here.
- Allow acreage planted with an uninsured second crop following the failure of a primary crop inside the similar crop yr to, nonetheless, be included as prevented planting eligible acreage.
- Provide an exception permitting prevented planting of a unique crop than the producer tried to plant when a producer doesn’t have a historical past of manufacturing two crops in the identical discipline if the producer can show intention.
- Allow the usage of an meant acreage report for the primary two years, as a substitute of solely the primary yr, for producers in a brand new county, the place they’ve by no means produced the crop.
RMA is authorizing extra flexibilities as a consequence of coronavirus whereas persevering with to help producers, working by AIPs (resembling ProAg) to ship companies, together with processing insurance policies, claims and agreements. RMA workers are working with AIPs and different clients by cellphone, mail and electronically to proceed supporting crop insurance coverage protection for producers. Farmers with crop insurance coverage questions or wants ought to proceed to contact their trusted ProAg crop insurance coverage brokers about conducting enterprise remotely (by phone or electronic mail). More data could be discovered at farmers.gov/coronavirus.
The full USDA RMA press launch could be discovered here.
The USDA RMA continuously requested questions on the Prevented Planting Taskforce Recommendations could be discovered here.
Source: USDA RMA Press Release