The
report reinforces concerns that insuring the nation’s crops will
get more expensive for insurance companies, farmers and
taxpayers as climate change drives more erratic weather events
that disrupt agriculture.
The federal government pays about 60% of the nation’s crop
insurance premiums through taxpayer subsidies, according to the
Congressional Budget Office, and those premiums tend to rise as
insurance payouts grow.
Insurance payments to farmers due to drought rose more than 400%
between 1995 and 2020 to $1.65 billion, while payments due to
excess moisture – like floods - rose nearly 300% to $2.61
billion, according to the nonprofit environmental group, which
examined publicly available data from the U.S. Department of
Agriculture.
Reuters reviewed the data, which showed a steady upward trend in
insurance payouts over the period.
During the period analyzed by EWG, the number of insured acres
grew just 84.5%, according to the data from the department’s
Risk Management Agency, which administers the federal crop
insurance program.
“As extreme weather has become more frequent, the climate crisis
has already increased insurance payments and premium subsidies.
These costs are expected to go up even more, as climate change
causes even more unpredictable weather conditions," EWG said in
the report.
The report did not detail average increases in premiums since
1995. The cost of insuring crops, however, could increase
between 3.5% and 22% by 2080 due to climate change, even if
farmers adapted what and where they plant, according to a 2019
USDA report.
The most commonly insured crops include corn, soybeans, wheat
and cotton.
The federal crop insurance program requires farmers to meet
minimal conservation standards, like not planting on land highly
vulnerable to erosion.
But Anne Weir Schechinger, the Midwest director of EWG, said
those standards should be tougher. “The program needs to be
reformed so it encourages farmers to be resilient to extreme
weather events that we know are ahead,” she said.
(Reporting by Leah Douglas in Washington; Editing by Matthew
Lewis)
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