How can farmers prepare for extreme weather ahead? Extreme weather forced the Federal Crop Insurance Program (FCIP) to pay out a record-breaking $17.3 billion in crop losses last year, as detailed in a new crop insurance report and crop loss mapping tool to be released at Noon EDT/11 a.m. CDT on Tuesday, August 27, by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). 2012’s record-breaking crop insurance payouts smashed the trend of annual Federal Crop Insurance payouts from 2001-2010, when crop losses averaged just $4.1 billion a year.
The online map at www.nrdc.org/water/your-soil-matters will include searchable county-by-county crop loss snapshots revealing the magnitude of crop loss in 2012, top extreme weather-related causes, and top 10 rankings of the states with the largest overall crop insurance payouts due to drought. The top 10 states to be highlighted (in alphabetical order): Kansas, Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, South Dakota, Texas and Wisconsin.
In 2012, American famers experienced devastating crop losses because of the yearlong drought. Last summer was the worst drought in 50 years across the nation’s breadbasket.