USDA’s Risk Management Agency (RMA) reminds Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio producers that the final date to apply for insurance coverage on s pring barley, B urley tobacco, cabbage, corn, cucumbers, dry beans, forage seeding, grain sorghum, green peas, hybrid seed corn, oats, popcorn, potatoes, processing beans, processing pumpkins, processing sweet corn, processing tomatoes, soybeans and sugarbeets is March 15. Current policyholders who wish to make changes to their existing policies als o have u ntil the sales closing date to do so .
Crop insurance provides protection against decreases in revenue and crop production losses due to natural perils such as drought and excessive moisture. Producers have a number of coverage choices, including yield coverage, revenue protection and area risk policies.
A number of important changes have been made to crop insurance for the 2016 crop year that producers may want to consider as the sales clos ing date approaches. The Actual Production History (APH) Yield Exclusion has been expanded to include more crops. The provision allows farmers to exclude eligible yields which occur from e xceptionally bad years (such as a year in which a natural disaster or other extreme weather occurs) from their production history when calculating yields used to establish their crop insurance coverage.
The Supplemental Coverage Option (SCO) is now available for alfalfa seed, canola, cultivated wild rice, dry peas, forage production, grass seed, mint, oats, onions, potatoes and rye in select counti es for the 2016 crop year. SCO is a county - level policy endorsement that covers a portion of the deductible of the underlying crop insurance policy.
Source:usda.gov