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Flooding in northwest Missouri has farmers asking questions about crop insurance again. The first important point is that farmers should contact their crop insurance agent before making any decisions. Notify your crop insurance agent if flooding has occurred on your fields, even if the crop was not yet planted. Some of the insurance issues you are likely to encounter, and can plan for, are below.

If the field was not already planted, you have until the final planting date before you officially have a claim. The final 2007 planting date for corn is June 5; for soybeans, June 20. If planting is prevented in the flooded field past either date for the intended crop, you are eligible for a prevented planting claim.

Prevented planting claims have several provisions that must be noted. First, the indemnity for prevented planting would only be 60 percent of your guarantee compared to if you had actually planted a crop and suffered a loss. Second, what you decide to do with the field on which you were unable to plant has an impact on your proven yield history. If you claimed prevented planting and decided to plant another crop on the field, the yield from the prevented planting acreage will be equal to 60 percent of your approved yield for the first insured crop to calculate your average yield for subsequent crop years. So, your proven yield will be adversely affected. But if you let the land lie without crops for this season or you do not claim prevented planting on corn, the prevented planted acreage is not considered when computing your production history. You need to weigh the potential for profit from a second crop against the cost of adversely affecting your yield history should you claim prevented planting and then plant a second crop.

If an already planted field is damaged or destroyed due to flooding, the first question is whether or not you will be able to replant. If able to replant, you can do so and receive from your crop insurance company a replanting payment to defer some of the costs. If you are unable to replant the intended crop before the final planting date (due to continued wet fields), you have two choices. You can let the land lie idle or plant a second crop.

If you take the loss and let the land lie idle, your indemnity will be computed based on your expected yield for that field.

If you plant a second crop (e.g. plant soybeans on land originally planted to corn or on land which you were prevented from planting corn), your indemnity payment on the first crop will be 35 percent of what the indemnity would have been had you let the land lie idle. The remaining 65 percent of the indemnity will be held until the harvest of the second crop.

If the second crop has no problems requiring an indemnity, you will receive the 65 percent of indemnity that was held back. If the second crop does earn an indemnity, you will need to choose whether to receive the indemnity on the second crop or the remaining 65 percent of the corn indemnity. You will not be able to get both indemnities.

Some other factors that will affect your decisions include:

• Should you decide to plant a second crop, you must have purchased crop insurance for that crop in 2007. For example, if you only insure corn acres and not soybean acres, you can't plant soybeans this year and have them insured. The deadline for purchasing crop insurance on soybeans is past.
• Should you decide to plant a second crop you will have premiums due on the first crop and the second crop. The first crop premiums will be adjusted downward to reflect the reduced indemnity associated with insuring a second crop.
• Should you decide to plant late (after June 5 for corn, after June 20 for soybeans in northern MO), there is a 1 percent drop in coverage for each day for 25 days past the final planting date.
• You must report your acreage in each crop to your crop insurance agent by July 15. Any changes from expectations when the crop insurance was originally purchased need to be recorded with your crop insurance agent.

Ray Massey
MasseyR@missouri.edu