‘Four corners’ of agriculture support crop insurance

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Leadership from the Senate and House agriculture committees delivered a clear message to the Crop Insurance Industry Annual Convention: Crop insurance has bicameral and bipartisan support from the “four corners” of agriculture.

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., and Ranking Member John Boozman, R-Ark., and House Agriculture Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pa., and Ranking Member David Scott, D-Ga., will be the chief architects of the next farm bill.

Speaking to the convention virtually, Stabenow emphasized the importance of crop insurance as a risk management tool.

“We are going to get this (farm bill) done by being creative and thoughtful and bipartisan. We need to make sure that our cornerstone is focused on our best risk management tool, and that’s called crop insurance,” she said.

The other members provided recorded remarks.

Boozman emphasized his commitment to a farm bill that addresses the “unique and unprecedented challenges” that America’s farmers and ranchers are currently facing.

“We must give producers the risk management tools they need to succeed — tools that reflect the nature of the challenges under which they operate,” he said. “Maintaining and improving crop insurance is at the top of my list of priorities (for the farm bill).”

Thompson spoke to the certainty of crop insurance and called attacks on crop insurance in the farm bill a “terrible idea.”

“Crop insurance is the most reliable form of risk management for producers,” he said, criticizing the Government Accountability Office. “Protecting crop insurance from attacks from terrible ideas, like those recently proposed by GAO, also remains a priority for the committee.”

Crop insurance is the cornerstone of the farm safety net, and Scott underscored this in his remarks.

“A strong farm bill means maintaining a very strong crop insurance program,” Scott said.

“Crop insurance helps our farmers … continue the hard work they do to feed our country and the world. And at its core, that is what the farm bill is all about: Keeping farmers farming, and keeping families in our nation fed,” he said.

This overwhelming support for crop insurance should come as no surprise.

Recent polling from National Crop Insurance Services found that 87% of voters believe it’s important that Congress support multi-generational family farmers by passing a farm bill that includes risk management tools like crop insurance that allow farmers to stay in business following disasters.