An Overview of Crop Insurance

The CRS report explained that, “From 2007 to 2016, the federal crop insurance title had the second-largest outlays in the farm bill after nutrition. The total net cost of the program during those years was about $72 billion. For FY2018 through FY2027, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that crop insurance will continue to be the second-largest farm bill outlay after nutrition, averaging about $7.7 billion a year, assuming current law remains in effect. After describing several of the challenges faced by early crop insurance providers, and including valuable historic perspective on the development of the modern federal crop insurance program, the report stated, “Between 1980 and 2015, acres enrolled in crop insurance grew from 26.6 million acres (12% of eligible acres) to about 238 million acres (86% of all acres), excluding hay, pasture, range, and forage and separately livestock and nurseries.  During that time frame, the number of crops insured increased from 28 to 123. The types of policies offered also increased over this period from one—yield insurance—to over 20, including yield, revenue, margin, and whole farm revenue, among others.”