March 13, 2019
President Donald Trump’s “I LOVE YOU!” tweet to farmers is facing another challenge: Budget cuts that will slash subsidies for crop insurance and small growers. Trump’s 2020 budget, released Monday, calls for a 15 percent funding drop for the Department …
October 29, 2015
The two-year budget deal produces savings from one of the most popular programs in farm country — federally subsidized crop insurance — and farm state lawmakers are furious. Senators and House members said Tuesday they weren’t notified of the cut …
November 20, 2014
U.S. farmers are about to reap a bumper harvest not just in corn and soybeans but also in new subsidies that could soar to $10 billion, blowing a hole in the government’s promise that its new five-year farm bill would …
January 6, 2014
A report commissioned by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) says that the federal crop insurance program over-compensated Corn Belt farmers by $7.8 billion during the 2012 drought. Insurance payouts that year totaled $14 billion whereas $6.2 billion would have been …
October 14, 2013
Farm subsidy reformers praised a vote by the U.S. House of Representatives to make the wealthiest growers pay more for federally subsidized crop insurance, the first eligibility limit on a program that costs $9 billion a year. The non binding …
September 12, 2013
Critics of the U.S. crop insurance program are calling for cuts to it and other agribusiness subsidies as Congress revamps farm policy. A bipartisan group of lawmakers planned to meet yesterday in Washington to re-examine U.S. farm spending for the …
September 9, 2013
A Depression-era program intended to save the nation’s farmers from ruin has grown into a 21st- century crutch enabling affluent growers and financial institutions to thrive at U.S. taxpayer expense. Federal crop insurance encourages farmers to gamble on risky plantings …
July 31, 2013
Sustained high prices for corn, soybeans and wheat combined with record U.S. crop-insurance payouts are encouraging farmers to plow fragile lands and put ecosystems at risk, an environmental advocacy group said. Northern Plains counties have seen the highest conversion of …
July 11, 2013
House Republicans passed a five-year U.S. farm-policy bill that retains subsidies to farmers and strips out food-stamp spending, costing it Democratic support. The plan was approved today 216-208, with no Democrats in support. The measure also would repeal underlying provisions …
May 2, 2013
U.S. farmers have collected a record $17 billion in crop insurance payments on drought-hit 2012 crops but the system could have spent half as much and still saved growers from ruinous losses, an insurance specialist said on Wednesday as the …