2026 Claims –

In our perfect world everyone would buy crop insurance, raise bumper crops, sell them for record profits and adjusters would spend their summers at the lake. Last year we had everything but the record profits. This year Mother Nature threw a wrench in all our plans and reminded us why we spend the money on insurance, most of you have had a chance to talk with an adjuster this summer and I’d bet they weren’t at the lake. In times like these nobody is having fun, but there are a couple things that you as the insured can do to make the process smoother.

1. Communicate With Your Agent – If you plan to do anything with a standing crop that’s not taking a combine over it, call your agent before you start so we can put you in contact with an adjuster.

2. Report Claims ASAP – Once you are confident that you will have a production claim notify your agent, we do not have to wait for harvest to be completed to turn in claims.

3. Collecting and Dividing Proof of Yields – Provide the adjuster with your proof of yield as soon as possible after harvest. To avoid agents influencing claims, RMA would like the insured to be the one to request proof of yields from the elevators and to be the one that splits out the individual fields. After you’ve collected and organized them, we can forward them to the adjuster for you.

4. Watch for the Adjusters Call – The adjuster will reach out as soon as possible to get started on your claim. If it’s something that will require an infield appraisal (chopping corn, baling soybeans) you should hear from them one or two days after you notify your agent of the claim. If it’s a production claim after harvest, it might take a little bit longer for them to reach out if they’re busy adjusting standing crops. If your claim is assigned to an out of area adjuster who has been brought in to help, we will send you their number so you can watch for their call without having to answer spam calls. If you don’t answer they should leave a voicemail, if they leave a voicemail please try to call them back as soon as possible.

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Double Crop Acre Eligibility –

Your number of double crop acres that are fully insurable are determined by the year that you planted the most acres back to another crop following wheat out of the last four. If you double cropped 100 acres in 2024 but planted 150 this year, you will be fully paid all wheat claims, and the following crop will be fully insurable like normal on the 100 acres that you have history for. For the remaining 50 acres you could have elected to take the full wheat payment and not insure the second crop, or you could have taken 35% of your wheat indemnity and fully insured the second crop. If you took the 35% payment and fully insured the second crop, you now get to choose the larger of either the remaining 65% of your wheat claim or the full payment for the second crop. If you take the full second crop payment you will not receive the rest of your wheat claim, but you also won’t have to pay the remaining 65% of the wheat indemnity.

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Wheat Premium Interest Deferral –

With the current conditions RMA has waived all wheat interest accrual until October 1st, 2026. After that interest will begin accruing as usual.

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Beginning Farmer and Rancher Discount –

Eligibility has been expanded to your first 10 years of farming. Your first two years you will receive a 15% premium discount, 13% discount in year three, 11% in year four, and 10% for five thru ten. Contact your agent to see if you’re eligible, we will need a signed application before wheat sales close (September 30th).

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ECO/SCO –

With local crop conditions and the global market, it’s looking like customers who bought up additional coverage through ECO and SCO will see a good return on their investment for 2026. I’m expecting that most counties in our area will receive at least an ECO payment for their dryland corn and wheat and may get end up getting both full payments on soybeans and milo. Irrigated is harder to guess, but is still a possibility depending on how much impact we see from the extreme temps and where harvest prices ends up. If you tuned out your agent’s sales pitch or just needed a refresher, ECO/SCO functions like ARC-CO as it allows you to protect a percentage of expected county revenue for that crop but pays off actual planted acres rather than base. Expected county revenue is set by the initial crop insurance price multiplied by the expected county yield, if the final county yield multiplied by the insurance harvest price is less than 95% of expected ECO will pay out, if it’s less than 90% SCO will pay. With the higher probability of triggering a claim comes a higher premium cost, to offset that RMA increased the premium subsidy from 65% to 80% in 2025.

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ARC/PLC Elections -

With the changes made to base acres in 2026 FSA pushed back the deadline to make elections until sometime after August 31st. The extra time gave us the chance to be confident where county yields will be and have a good feel for the general direction of the markets. It seems most likely that if either product is going to trigger a payment in 2026, it will be ARC for all crops. From what we are hearing currently we will go back to making ARC/PLC elections before March 15 in 2027.

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Livestock Forage Disaster Program (LFP) –

Pasture acres in Harvey, Kingman, McPherson, Rice, Reno and all counties to the west have qualified for 5 months’ worth of drought relief payments. To be eligible to receive the payment all grazed acres must be turned into FSA by the December 15 acreage reporting date and the landowner must have an active AD-1026 on file. Payment rates will differ depending on the forage payment factor, species, and animal size/maturity. All grazing animals qualify (Cattle, Sheep, Goats, Buffalo and even Equine). If you’ve had to haul feed to grazing livestock, you are eligible to receive $3.75 per loaded mile. If you’ve had to haul water due to drought to livestock you may be paid $0.11 per gallon. Call your local FSA office with questions or to apply, the application deadline is March 15 2027.

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One Farmer One File –

USDA has partnered with Palantir to help streamline the application process for government programs, and to increase communication and data sharing between federal agencies (FSA, RMA, NRCS) to help catch fraud and waste in taxpayer subsidized programs. I expect that the change will cause some short-term hardships as FSA offices adjust to the new program and procedures but in the end should simplify and speed up interactions with the various agencies. With the increased flow of data between the agencies, it will become even more important that all information reported for government programs is consistent and accurate. We will continue to keep you updated as we learn more.

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2027 Wheat Sales Closing-

We need to have all applications for 2027 wheat signed by Sep. 30. Reach out to us or your agent if you would like to look at quotes for adding ECO/SCO, adjusting coverage levels or changing unit structure. If you would like to see how 2026 yields impacted your APH’s let us know and we will get them to you.

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2027 Fall Planted Acreage Reporting-

Eventually One Farmer One File will move acreage reporting to FSA away from handwriting on physical map books to all prefilled digital reporting. But I expect that we will still report the 2027 wheat acres on map books like usual. To help us be more accurate in our acreage reporting and to help catch if there are any errors on your 578, we would like you to send your map book to your agent while you turn it back into FSA. If you scan it back to FSA please CC your agent on that email, or if you report it in person ask that the FSA office forward it on to your agent. Then we can have at least a portion of your acreage report prefilled out when we meet to get your signature and if there are any discrepancies between what we have and what is on your 578 we can get it corrected timelier.

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Pasture Rainfall and Forage (PRF)-

Is a rainfall product that uses area data to indemnify producers for lack of rainfall on any perennial forage (pasture, or hay). Growers select at least four two-month intervals to protect the periods of the year when they believe that rainfall is most important for forage production.

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Livestock Risk Protection (LRP)-

LRP is a flexible policy that allows producers to hedge against cattle market downturns at a subsidized price. Cattle may be price protected from conception to their terminal end point. LRP is subsidized the same as MPCI crop insurance with 90-95% policies being our most popular. With indemnity being triggered by market movements rather than individual sales, cattle may be marketed up to 60 days before or after the planned end date or retained and still be eligible to receive an indemnity. The flexible marketing window allows you to best manage for current market and environmental conditions. LRP premium isn’t due until the end of the policy so cattle should either have been sold in a profitable market or will have the premium paid by the coming indemnity.

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Thank You –

If you’re still reading this, we appreciate you investing your time to learn more about your crop insurance policy and what other options are available to help mitigate risk going forward. We know that most of you didn’t get into production agriculture to learn about the federal government’s ever-changing rules and regulations concerning crop insurance. But we feel that the more informed you are as the insured the better we as the agent can make sure that your insurance plan fits your goals as an operation. Auto renewing your policy under the same structure without making any changes is a fine strategy as long as you understand how recent changes to the industry may increase or decrease your degree of risk. You may find that your current policy isn’t offering the protection that you believed it did when you initially signed up, and there may be better options out there that won’t significantly impact your premium cost. We appreciate the opportunity to help tailor the risk management strategy that best serves your operation. We appreciate your business and look forward to continuing the partnership going forward. If you ever have any questions or want to bounce ideas off someone, please reach out, crop insurance is what we talk about all day anyways. Or let us know if you’d like an agent to stop by for an in-person visit, we’re more than happy to get out of the office and have the chance to see your family’s operation.

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To Show Our Appreciation for What You Do -

We know this is a busy time of year for everyone and it’s tough to get away for an update meeting. So, to make up for the free meal that you usually get out of Terra, we are offering something new. Free pizza delivery, we will bring pizza and drinks out for you and your harvesting crew over the lunch hour. Please let us in the office or your agent know at least 24 hours in advance where you would like your pizza from, what kind, and when and where to bring it. If you have a breakdown or something comes up, try to let us know at least an hour before we are supposed to be out there and we will reschedule. One time only please.

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Nate Pitts Agency Manager – 620-747-2924 or nate.pitts@terrafinancialinc.com

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Terra Office Hesston – 620-869-9099

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