This edition of the
AgMax Crop newsletter
provides important
information about the
2017 crop year for
spring-seeded crops.
NCIS Survey Regarding
Crop Insurance
National Crop Insurance Service
(NCIS), a national crop insurance
trade association, on April 3 - 7, 2016
conducted a poll of 1,000 registered
voters to gauge their support for
farmers and the crop insurance
program. According to the poll, 92
percent of Americans support an
effective safety net for American
farmers and ranchers with 81 percent
of respondents believing agriculture is
important to our national security.
Voters also support a discounted crop
insurance program by more than a 4
to 1 margin according to the poll.
Source: NCIS, http://www.
cropinsuranceinamerica.org/
wp-content/uploads/CropInsurance-Public-Opinion-Poll.
pdf
Crop Insurance Serves Both Big and
Small Producers
Every eligible producer, large or
small, who wishes to purchase
crop insurance may do so and the
premium support provided for any
given plan of insurance is the same
no matter the size of the producer.
The primary benefit of crop insurance
is the reduction of financial risk, no
matter the size of the farm.
Reducing financial risk helps a
producer maintain, expand, and
increase the efficiency of their farm.
Crop Insurance improves access
to credit, increases investment in
production assets, and enables the
producer to recover after a disaster.
These are benefits to all producers,
large and small.
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The Agricultural Act of 2014 (2014 Farm Bill) took steps
to make crop insurance even more attractive to small
producers by including organic operations and those run
by new and beginning farmers. Every acre enrolled in
crop insurance helps spread risk, which ultimately lowers
premiums for all.
Check out a good article, ‘In Contrast to the Critics, Crop
Insurance Does Not Discriminate’, at:
http://portal.criticalimpact.com/
vm2/2f19f404b89ed7a5/25838/
43f5c8cb48d307b4766b5d60522e6026
Source: Economic Research Service (ERS)
Acreage Crop Reporting
Streamlining Initiative
The Acreage Crop Reporting Streamlining Initiative (ACRSI)
streamlines acreage reporting for growers by allowing
them to report their insured and non-insured acreage
through their insurance agent. The data is then shared
electronically between the insurance agent, Approved
Insurance Provider (AIP), and Farm Service agency (FSA)
county office.
For spring 2016, ACRSI includes the crops listed below in
all states:
Alfalfa; Corn (Including: Field, Popcorn and Sweet); CRP;
Fallow; Grass; Oats; Rye; Soybeans; Wheat (Including:
Khorasan); Cotton (Including: Upland and ELS); Peanuts;
Rice; and Sorghum (Including: Grain, Nongrain and Dual
Purpose)
Some key points to remember are:
• ACRSI does not change any Crop Insurance
reporting requirements or deadlines.
• ACRSI does not change any FSA reporting
requirements or deadlines.
• The grower is still required to complete an Acreage
Report with their Crop Insurance Agent.
• The grower is still required to certify their acreage
with their FSA office.
• If the grower reports their acreage to their agent first,
their insurance company has the option of reporting
their acreage to the ACRSI system which may
reduce the time spent when the grower visits their
FSA office.
• If the grower reports their acreage to their FSA
office first, the FSA has the option of reporting their
acreage to the ACRSI system which may reduce the
time spent when the grower visits their crop
insurance agent.
Find a good facts sheet at: http://www.rma.usda.gov/
help/faq/acrsi.html
Source: FSA,
https://www.fsa.usda.gov/Internet/FSA_Notice/
cm_780.pdf
“Burn down your cities and leave our
farms, and your cities will spring up again
as if by magic; but destroy our farms and
the grass will grow in the streets of every
city in the country.”
– William Jennings Bryan
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USDA Makes Changes to
Improve the Prevented
Planting Program
Native Sod
New Provisions to Take Effect for 2017
Spring Crops
The 2014 Farm Bill requires producers’ benefits to be
reduced if they till native sod acreage (5 or more acres) to
grow an annual crop during the first 4 crop years they are
covered by Federal crop insurance for that acreage. This
reduction in benefits applies only to native sod acreage
and does not extend to other acreage in the operation.
Native sod acreage is acreage that has never been tilled
or that an insured cannot prove has been previously tilled
for crop production. They will have to provide acceptable
documentation to their Approved Insurance Provider to
prove the acreage was previously tilled.
WASHINGTON, Nov. 22, 2016 – The U.S. Department of
Agriculture’s (USDA) Risk Management Agency (RMA)
today announced updated factors for prevented planting
coverage that will strengthen the integrity of the federal
crop insurance program. The updates were made to
address the recommendations of a 2013 USDA Office of
Inspector General (OIG) report, and are supported by the
data from a subsequent third-party study commissioned
at the urging of the OIG. These improvements will ensure
that the program continues to be a well-run program
that provides a strong safety net for producers.
The Native Sod guidelines apply to all counties in the
states of: Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, North
Dakota, and South Dakota.
Prevented planting coverage provides producers
protection if they are unable to plant an insured crop by
the final planting date. When adverse weather prevents
planting, a prevented planting payment is made to
compensate for the producer’s pre-planting costs
generally incurred in preparation for planting the crop.
These costs can include purchase of machinery, land
rent, fertilizer, actions taken to ready the field, pesticide,
labor, and repairs. The prevented planting factor is a
percentage of the individual insurance guarantee and
varies by crop, based on an estimate of pre-planting costs.
The producers’ benefits affected are a reduction of
premium subsidy, a reduced insurance guarantee, and the
elimination of yield substitution in the insurance guarantee.
New for 2017 - New Breaking acres of Native Sod are
cumulative for the 2017 crop year going forward. If you
break 2 acres of Native Sod in 2017 and are breaking more
than 3 acres of Native Sod in 2018 or later, the total is over
5 acres so the reductions above would apply.
Learn more at: http://www.rma.usda.gov/pubs/rme/
nativesod.pdf
[Source: Risk Management Agency (RMA)]
These updates were required to address the
recommendations in OIG’s 2013 report: RMA Controls
Over Prevented Planting. The OIG recommended that the
agency review the prevented planting factors and make
changes if necessary. RMA commissioned a third-party
evaluation of prevented planting coverage, which provided
recommendations for determining prevented planting
factors. The evaluation was available for public comment
from Jan. 30, 2015, to April 15, 2015. RMA evaluated
the public comments and determined that adjustments
to the evaluation’s recommendations were necessary.
RMA reviewed prevented planting factors for barley, corn,
cotton, grain sorghum, rice, soybeans and wheat for
2017 as part of an effort to ensure that prevented planting
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factors most accurately reflect the pre-planting input
costs of producers. Today’s rulemaking will improve
RMA’s ability to manage the prevented planting
factors moving forward. While the prevented planting
factors will be reviewed and updated for all crops with
prevented planting coverage, these first seven crops
are being updated for the Spring 2017 planting season.
Over time, the prevented planting factors may go up
or down depending upon changes in input costs. RMA
will evaluate the effectiveness of the recent changes
and modify them as needed in coming years. Below is a
table that lists updated prevented planting factors.
Today’s changes build upon recent improvements
that protect the integrity of the federal crop insurance
program. Due to an improved sampling methodology
and other efforts, the crop insurance improper payment
rate for 2015 was half that of the government-wide
improper payment rate average. The program’s
longstanding loss history demonstrates that rates
are actuarially accurate. RMA continues to utilize
technology and data mining to ensure that the crop
insurance program is well-managed and free of fraud,
waste, and abuse.
USDA works to strengthen and support American
agriculture, an industry that supports one in 11
American jobs, provides American consumers with
more than 80 percent of the food we consume,
ensures that Americans spend less of their paychecks
at the grocery store than most people in other
countries, and supports markets for homegrown
renewable energy and materials. Since 2009, USDA
has provided $5.6 billion in disaster relief to farmers
and ranchers; expanded risk management tools with
products like Whole Farm Revenue Protection; and
helped farm businesses grow with $36 billion in farm
credit. The Department has engaged its resources
to support a strong next generation of farmers and
ranchers by improving access to land and capital;
building new markets and market opportunities; and
extending new conservation opportunities. USDA
has developed new markets for rural-made products,
including more than 2,700 biobased products through
USDA’s BioPreferred program; and invested $64
billion in infrastructure and community facilities to
help improve the quality of life in rural America. For
more information, visit www.usda.gov/results.
Release No.: RMA-16-143 can be found at
http://www.rma.usda.gov/news/2016/11/
preventedplanting.pdf
[Source: Risk Management Agency (RMA)]
Prevented Planting Coverage Factors
Crop
CurrentRecommendation Final
From Evaluation
Corn 60%
50%
55%
Soybeans 60%
60%
60%
Wheat 60%
60%
60%
Cotton 50%
35%
50%
Grain Sorghum 60%
60%
60%
Barley 60%
60%
60%
Rice 45%
45%
55%
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Policyholders who elect HR-ACE may choose to have their
acreage insured under HR-ACE in one enterprise unit, if
they qualify, and their non-high risk acreage insured under
the base policy in one enterprise unit or in enterprise units
by practice.
Whole-Farm Revenue
Protection
Whole-Farm Revenue Protection (WFRP), available in
all counties in all 50 states, provides a risk management
safety net for all commodities on the farm under one
insurance policy. This insurance plan is tailored for any
farm with up to $8.5 million in insured revenue, including
farms with specialty or organic commodities (both crops
and livestock), or those marketing to local, regional, farmidentity preserved, specialty, or direct markets.
WFRP provides protection against the loss of insured
revenue due to an unavoidable natural cause of loss that
occurs during the insurance period and also provides
carryover loss coverage if you are insured the following
year. Coverage levels range from 50 percent to 85 percent;
Catastrophic Risk Protection (CAT) coverage is not
available.
Source: RMA, http://www.rma.usda.gov/pubs/rme/
wfrpfactsheet.pdf
High-Risk Alternative
Coverage Endorsement
Modifications: 2017 and
Succeeding Crop Years
The Federal Crop Insurance Corporation Board of
Directors (FCIC Board) approved the High-Risk Alternative
Coverage Endorsement (HR-ACE) on March 1, 2012. The
only unit structures initially available for HR-ACE were
basic and optional units. On February 5, 2015, the Board
approved enterprise units beginning with the 2017 crop
year.
In order to be eligible for an enterprise unit under HR-ACE,
the policyholder must elect and qualify for an enterprise
unit or enterprise units by practice on the base policy.
The HR-ACE allows policyholders to insure high-risk
acres at an additional coverage level that is lower than the
coverage level on their non-high-risk acres (as an optional
endorsement to a Federal reinsured corn, soybean,
wheat, or grain sorghum crop provisions). The HR-ACE
is available in counties with a high-risk classification in
Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa (excluding the 35 counties
that fall into the Prairie Pothole National Priority Area),
Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri,
Nebraska (limited to counties east of Holt County), Ohio,
and Tennessee.
Source: RMA,
http://www.rma.usda.gov/help/faq/highrisk.html
USDA Announces Record
Demand for CRP
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)
announced it will accept 411,000 acres into the
Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) via its general
enrollment this year as well as 101,000 under its new
grassland enrollment. Over three million acres were
offered for enrollment this year making it one of the most
competitive enrollment periods in the CRP’s 30-year
history.
The FSA received over 26,000 offers to enroll more than
1.8 million acres during the general enrollment period, and
over 4,600 offers to enroll more than one million acres in
the grasslands program. Coming off a record-setting 2015
continuous enrollment of over 860,000 acres, more than
364,000 acres already have been accepted for 2016 in the
CRP continuous enrollment, triple the pace of last year.
The 2014 Farm Bill capped the total number of acres that
may be enrolled at 24 million for fiscal years 2017 and
2018.
Source: USDA, http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/
usda/usdahome?contentid=2016/05/0105.
xml&contentidonly=true
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Important Dates
For quick access to specific dates for your area, go to the
RMA’s website and select ‘Information Browser,’ then click
‘Actuarial Information Browser, 2011 Reinsurance Year and
beyond,’ next click on ‘Reinsurance Year 2017’ and put in
your criteria. You will have access to Sales Closing Dates,
Production Reporting Deadlines, Acreage Reporting Dates,
Premium Billing Dates, etc.
Go to: http://webapp.rma.usda.gov/apps/
actuarialinformationbrowser/
Insurance Changes Expand
Farm Safety Net for Double
Cropping
Acting Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Michael Scuse
announced that the federal crop insurance program will
provide additional flexibility to farmers. The modifications
center on the practice of growing two crops on the same
field at different times of the year, which is known as
double cropping.
“We are constantly looking for ways to meet the needs of
our farmers and seek out their feedback so we can best
provide them with the tools and resources they need to
grow and support their operations,” Scuse said. “After
receiving input from a number of stakeholders, we made
these changes to the federal crop insurance program
to provide greater flexibility and better reflect current
agricultural practices.”
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Risk
Management Agency (RMA) worked to provide additional
flexibility requested by farmers. Double cropping
requirements are revised to adequately recognize changes
in growing farm operations or for added land. This change
will address both land added to an operation, and account
for multiple crop rotations. These changes will be in
effective for the 2017 crop year for most crops, starting
with winter wheat.
Source: USDA,
https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/
USDAOC/bulletins/151271a
“The first farmer was the first man. All
historic nobility rests on the possession
and use of land.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson
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NASS Survey
AgMaxCrop.com Website
USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS)
is beginning to collect data from more than 100,000
farmers and ranchers for its annual Agricultural Resource
Management Survey (ARMS). The survey looks at all
aspects of U.S. agricultural production, including farm
financial well-being, chemical usage, and various farm
characteristics. In 2016, the survey will take a closer look
at corn production and both organic and conventional milk
production in the U.S.
AgMaxCrop.com is your online, one-stop ag-related
resource! Be sure to visit www.AgMaxCrop.com for key,
up-to-date information including:
ARMS is a joint effort of NASS and ERS. The information
the agencies obtain through the survey influences national
and state policy-making decisions. In addition, ARMS data
is used to calculate the farm sector portion of the gross
domestic product (GDP). The survey also collects detailed
information on production practices, costs, and returns for
13 principal commodities on a rotating basis. The last time
ARMS focused on corn and dairy was in 2010.
NASS is already working with producers on the first phase
of this survey. The survey is conducted in three phases
from May 2016 through April 2017. The first phase screens
participants to make sure they accurately represent the
entire U.S. farm sector. During the second phase, NASS
will collect information on production practices and
chemical use for specific commodities. In the final phase,
NASS will survey producers on cost of production, farm
income and production expenditures.
For more information about the 2016 ARMS, go to:
https://www.nass.usda.gov/Surveys/Guide_to_
NASS_Surveys/Ag_Resource_Management/index.
php
Source: NASS, http://1.usa.gov/1PHpMj9
• Local Cash Grain Prices & Commodity Futures
• Comprehensive Weather Data
• Market Commentary: in the morning, midday, and at
market closing
• Market & Ag Headline News: including videos, blogs,
forums, and more
• Two-way Communications Portal: if you choose,
text messages with real-time commodity pricing and
alerts triggered by market movement
“Life on a farm is a school of patience;
you can’t hurry the crops or make an ox in
two days.” - Henri Alain
The information contained in this mailing provides only a general
overview of the crop insurance program. For further information
and an evaluation of your insurance needs, contact your AgMax
crop insurance agent.
Crop insurance coverage is underwritten by Western Agricultural Insurance Company (WAIC), West Des Moines, Iowa. WAIC is not licensed in all states and not all products are available in all states.
WAIC is an equal opportunity provider. These policies are available to all producers, regardless of race, color, national origin, gender, religion, age, disability, political beliefs, sexual orientation and marital
family status. 311-076 (12-16)
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