Sign Up For The Farm Bill

Many farmers are not aware that each year they have to stop by their local Farm Service Agency Office to sign up for the Farm Bill. Remember a couple of years ago when the new Farm Bill was being implemented, we were given the choice of signing up for the ARC County, ARC Individual, or PLC? Whichever choice you made was locked in for the duration of this Farm Bill, but you still have to sign up each year. It only takes about five minutes. However, if you farm land in more than one county you should take a minute and ask about the payment rates for each county under the ARC County Program.

Most farmers chose ARC County because we knew we were going to get a payment in 2014, and probably 2015, too. It gets rather complicated when the USDA calculates the payment rate for each county. They factor in the corn and soybean yield for each county and also use an average price for the entire marketing year. The point is payments can vary greatly by county. For the 2014 crop year, most farmers got the maximum payment for corn of $70 to $75 an acre. Some counties got a payment on beans while others did not. For the 2015 crop year, it appears there is going to be a lot of variability for corn too.

Most farmers that have land in more than one county designate a control county. That means one county takes care of all the farmer's land in multiple counties. I have land in Faribault, Freeborn and Waseca counties. Waseca is my control county. So, my ARC County payments use Waseca County for my land in Faribault and Freeborn counties. It appears the ARC County corn payment for 2015 for Waseca County will be about $65 an acre, Faribault $42 and Freeborn $32. In my case I will get the largest payment because Waseca is my control county. If Freeborn County was my control county I would not be very happy.

The USDA has made a one-time determination that will allow farmers to get their payments for 2014 and 2015 broken out by where their corn or soybean base is in each county. You can go to your FSA office and ask them to run the numbers on what your payment was for 2014 and what it would be by splitting the counties out. While we will not know the final payment rate for 2015 until September, we have a pretty good idea what it will be. They can run the numbers for 2015 too. It is important to check soon because the deadline to split your counties out for the ARC payment is April 15. If you only have land in one county, none of this matters. If you have land in multiple counties and are confused, get into your FSA office and ask. Making the wrong decision might cost you a lot of money!