Growers, lenders, conservationists call on Congress to back crop insurance in farm bill

INDIAN WELLS, Calif. — Crop insurance is a vital risk management tool that should be maintained and strengthened in the next farm bill, according to a panel of commodity growers, lenders and conservationists.

The panel was part of the presentations at the crop insurance industry’s annual conference in California.

“Crop insurance is one of our most important tools for our growers in terms of protecting their yields as well as their revenue,” said Jake Westlin of the National Association of Wheat Growers.

Wayne Stoskopf of the National Corn Growers Association said crop insurance has been the cornerstone of the farm safety net for the majority of corn growers.

“It works really well,” he said. “I don’t expect that to change at all. They are continuing to innovate and look at things like the post application coverage endorsement as something that our growers identified as a need for split nitrogen practices and wanted to continue to see advancements and innovations there.”

Robbie Minnich of the National Cotton Council said crop insurance is very important to cotton growers.

“As you all well know, almost every acre of cotton gets some level of crop insurance,” he said. “So, we want to make sure crop insurance is there, it’s available, it’s affordable and we can do whatever we can do to support the industry.”

Ben Mosely of the USA Rice Federation said innovations in crop insurance are making it more attractive to rice growers.

“Obviously there’s a lot of new crop insurance policies and endorsements that have come on in the last 10 plus years that are very attractive to us,” he said. “We are taking on more crop insurance acreage every year. It’s been a great program.”

Skylar Sowder of the Farm Credit Council said crop insurance is hugely important to lenders.

“It is a vital risk management tool,” she said. “Additionally, a lot of our farm credit associations also provide crop insurance as a service to their customers.”

Kellis Moss of Ducks Unlimited said his group is a proud to partner with the crop insurance industry.

“We’d like to see as many acres in production have crop insurance on their farms as possible,” he said. “And we couldn’t be prouder of our partnership, or relationship. We think it’s great. It’s continuing in a good direction.”