Time For Crop Insurance Reform

Congress created crop insurance in 1938 to help protect farmers and U.S. food production from the sort of natural and financial calamities that crushed farmers during the Great Depression.

Now, the Department of Agriculture administers more than 2 million individual policies each year, covering nearly 300 million acres of farmland.

But the program has not kept pace with the evolution of the agriculture industry.

Republican Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Democratic Sen. Jean Shaheen of New Hampshire are on the mark with their reform bill, the Assisting Family Farmers through Insurance Reform Measures Act.

Because of the ongoing conversion of agriculture from family farms to big agri-business industrial farms, taxpayer-funded crop insurance premium subsidies increasingly go to huge businesses that don’t need the help. The program also guarantees huge profits to insurers.