Crop Insurance Takes A Disproportionate Share of Cuts
In the President's budget reduction proposal released yesterday, crop insurance and the farmers who both support it and depend on it are once again being asked to shoulder a disproportionate portion of the budget cuts.
In response to being asked to take more than $8 billion in budget cuts over the next decade, Tom Zacharias, President of National Crop Insurance Services, released the following statement:
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A Broad Spectrum of Voices from All Corners of Agriculture Sing the Praises of Crop Insurance
 The recent Farm Bill hearing in Wichita, Kansas has been called “a crop insurance pep rally” by some who point to the fact that when a panel of farmers and producers were asked by Senate Ag Committee Chairman Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) what they thought was the most important farm policy, the answer was “crop insurance.”
This panel isn’t the exception but the rule. In fact, over the last six months, a large swath of rural America has praised the farm policy that has truly become rural America’s most cherished tool for hedging risk: crop insurance.
These quotes are just a sampling from the opinion pages, newswires and radio stations from coast to coast.
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The Lone Star State Is Unfortunately Exceptional
by Dee Vaughan
 Texas is an exceptional state, and most Texans will be happy to explain why that’s so. Unfortunately, for this year, that term also applies to the bone-dry conditions that we’ve seen unfold over the last 12 months. Texas, it seems, is locked in what weather experts call “an exceptional drought,” something many parts of the state haven’t experienced since the dustbowl era.
Here in the Panhandle, it’s barely rained since October. And it’s been over 100 degrees for more days than most of us can count. I’ve heard there’s even a sign in Texas that says “Satan called, he wants his weather back.”
At times like this, with droughts here in Texas and historic flooding elsewhere, it’s not difficult to comprehend the inherent risks we face in agriculture. Luckily, Congress recognized long ago that in order to ensure a stable and safe food supply for the country, there needed to be farm policies in place to serve as a safeguard against damaging weather or wild market fluctuations.
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