FSA Hopes Rise

Nothing makes a bigshot bureaucrat's heart sing like the prospect of another program to administer. From a discussion of the current status of farm bill:

“Another thing I have been talking about is that we ought to look at the ag disaster program in terms of paying something for this coverage. It will not be crop insurance, it will be a separate program in the Farm Service Agency (FSA). The days of just giving something away is over with. Producers will sign up for it if they want it; if not, they do not have to take the offer. But signup will involve some cost...that just makes sense. So we have some element of payment in it. Perhaps participants will give up some of their direct payments in exchange of getting a better safety net – not all of their direct payments, but some minimum level of coverage. They could buy up (to a higher level) of coverage under this program, but this is not crop insurance. It will not be actuarially sound. And, again, there would be a crop insurance requirement to be covered under the ag disaster aid plan. So this could actually be a pretty good safety net. And it could serve as a transition to another program in the future.” Peterson said, “The Bush administration originally pushed their GAP coverage, but I said, 'Look, this will not be crop insurance. It is not actuarially sound. It will be run by the FSA, so give it your best shot. What they did looks pretty good.”