Extra Year for “Prairie Pothole States”

The USDA announced on Thursday, June 30, 2011 that the “Prairie Pothole States” of Montana, North and South Dakota, Minnesota and Iowa will have one extra year to use in their prevented planting insurance coverage.

Normally, the prevented planting coverage insurance requires one crop in the last three years.  In these states, for many farmers, the last crop they had was in 2008.  Thus, under the old rules, these farmers would have been unable to get this coverage next year. 

However, USDA has changed the rules for these states to use one crop in the last four years instead of three years which will allow many farmers to use the 2008 crop year.