From Tom Smiarowski and Paul Russell, UMass Extension Risk Management/Crop Insurance Education Program
Attached you will find the 2017 Massachusetts Federal Crop Insurance Fact Sheets for apples and peaches. Crop insurance for apples is available in all Massachusetts counties. Crop insurance for peaches is available in Hampshire, Hampden, Middlesex & Worcester counties. Peaches in other Massachusetts counties may be insured by Written Agreement (a process completed by a licensed Federal Crop Insurance agent using existing actuarial data from neighboring counties) if specific criteria are met. If crop insurance is not available, similar protection may be available through the Non-insured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP) from the USDA - Farm Service Agency (FSA) Office that serves your farming operation. All other fruit crops may be insured through a Written Agreement or NAP.
Deadline to purchase a new Federal Crop Insurance Policy for apples or peaches, or, to purchase NAP coverage on all perennial crops is November 20th. The same November 20th deadline applies to canceling an existing Federal Crop Insurance policy or NAP coverage along with the deadline to make changes to an existing Federal Crop Insurance policy or NAP coverage.
Another option that fruit growers may wish to explore is obtaining coverage through the Whole Farm Revenue Protection Program (WFRP). WFRP is a revenue based policy that provides varying coverage levels to your historical average revenues using your IRS Schedule F. It is permissible to have both a "Buy-Up" Federal Crop Insurance policy and WFRP but you cannot have the Catastrophic (CAT) level of coverage on any insurable crop and WFRP. Deadline to purchase a WFRP policy is March 15th but please bear in mind that if you have an existing CAT policy on either apples and/or peaches you must cancel that CAT coverage or upgrade to a "Buy-Up" policy by November 20 to purchase WFRP coverage. A copy of the WFRP Fact Sheet is attached.
For more information on these and other related topics, you are encouraged to visit the RMA website at
www.rma.usda.gov and the FSA website at https://www.fsa.usda.gov/ or contact UMass Extension Agricultural Risk Management Consultants Paul Russell at pmrussell@umext.umass.edu or Tom Smiarowski at tsmiarowski@umext.umass.edu.
Federal Crop Insurance policies are sold through licensed, private Federal Crop Insurance agents.
A list of crop insurance agents is available at all USDA Service Centers or on the RMA website at: http://www.rma.usda.gov/tools/agent.html. For your benefit a list of licensed Federal Crop Insurance sales agents is attached. Keep in mind that this list changes constantly and the attached listing is current as of 10/27/16. NAP coverage can be obtained at the local USDA-FSA Office that serves your farming operation.
Apple crop insurance fact sheet
