KIA&B 2017 Vol. 22, No. 3 | Page 24

Exploring the Options: A Roadmap to Guide Risk Management Decisions I n advance of every new crop season, agents begin the ritual of preparing a good risk management plan for their policyholders. Knowing all of the products available for their area can be a daunting task. With federal coverage for over 100 crops, how does an agent know what products and endorsements are best? Is an 80% Revenue Protection policy with a Basic Hail plan preferable to a 75% Revenue Plan with a Replant Option and a Company Supplemental Product? What about coverage for livestock, nursery or haying/grazing land? With so much to consider, this brief overview can help you make sense of all available options. Rainfall Index – Pasture, Rangeland and Forage The Rainfall Index plan of insurance provides protection against a single peril – the lack of precipitation. Coverage can be purchased by landlords, tenants, and owner/ operators for those acres important to their haying and grazing operations. The PRF program is designed to give farmers and ranchers the ability to buy insurance protection for losses of forage produced for grazing or harvested for hay, which result in increased costs for feed, destocking, depopulating, or other actions. 22 Producers may select from a variety of coverage levels, productivity factors and two-month index intervals to personalize their plan. The Rainfall Index program uses weather data collected by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to determine rainfall levels. When the final grid index falls below your trigger grid index, you may receive an indemnity. Whole-Farm Revenue Protection Whole-Farm Revenue Protection (WFRP) provides a risk management safety net for all commodities on the farm under one insurance policy. This plan is tailored for any farm with up to $8.5 million in insured revenue, including farms with specialty or organic commodities (both crops and livestock), or those marketing to local, regional, farm- identity preserved, specialty or direct markets. WFRP protects a farm against the loss of revenue that is earned or expected to be earned from commodities produced during the insurance period, whether sold or not; commodities bought for resale during the insurance period; and all commodities on the farm except timber, forest, forest products, and animals for sport, show or pets. KANSAS INSURANCE AGENT & BROKER | May - June 2017 |