By Adam Warthesen, Land Stewardship Project Just when you think the facts and figures around federal subsidized crop insurance can’t get any more outlandish, new numbers emerge exposing the out-of-control spending and lack of accountability for this area of farm policy. Earlier this month, USDA released the most recent data on crop insurance costs. It’s… Read more »
Posts Tagged: commodity program
Crop Insurance: A Safety Net Becomes a Threat
When it comes to the crop insurance sweepstakes, southwest Minnesota farmer Darwyn Bach is a winner. But he concedes that his good fortune presents a quandary, since the way the program is implemented these days creates significant losers: the soil, beginning farmers and Main Street businesses that suffer when the number of families in a… Read more »
Ag Conservation’s Unfair Burden
At a time when the budget mantra “we must all share in the pain” is being repeated ad nauseam, it doesn’t take much searching to find some hypocritical exceptions. Take, for example, the Congressional proposal to cut $60 billion from the federal budget: farm conservation programs are practically eviscerated, while commodity crop subsidies remain untouched…. Read more »