Fargo PP Listening Session Reveals Crop Insurance Opportunities

In a USDA listening session in Fargo, North Dakota, hundreds of farmers from the tri-state area came together to share how they feel prevented planting could be improved. USDA’s Risk Management Agency (RMA) said the turnout was the largest of all the hearings held so far. In 2022, there were a total of 4 million prevented planting acres in North Dakota, South Dakota and Minnesota.

The Federal Crop Insurance Corporation is holding 14 listening sessions across the U.S. this year to learn what could be improved while preserving the program’s integrity. Farmers in Fargo asked if prevented planting payments could increase with the final harvest price (for those policies with harvest revenue coverage) rather than the projected harvest price, increasing payments by about 6%, on average. There would need to be a proportional increase in policy premiums. A North Dakota farmer also proposed increasing the current “1 in 4” rule, which accounts for consecutive years of excessive moisture, to a one in five or even six years if presidential disaster programs have been implemented.

The final listening session will be held in Las Cruces, New Mexico, on August 24, 2023, and the last online comments are due by September 1, 2023. After all of the listening sessions are completed and comments gathered, RMA staff will begin working on the crop insurance provisions for prevented planting .

Read more on the listening session and farmers’ suggestions here.