03/10/05 Sign up begins for disaster program

Farm and Ranch March 10, 2005 Drought may be on the minds of many in agriculture in the Northwest this year, but there were crop losses in 2003 and 2004 too from weather and other related disasters. And starting Monday, March 14th sign up begins at local Farm Service Agency Offices for the Crop Disaster Program signed into law last fall. Genie Caudill, a program specialist with the Washington Farm Service Agency state office says the program will be very similar to those in 2001 and 2002. Caudill: "Initially the producers has to have suffered a 35 percent loss to be eligible for any Crop Disaster Program benefits. Also along with that is a separate quality program where a producer doesn't necessarily have to have had a production loss, but if the quality of a crop was reduced by 20% then there is a quality payment that is calculated for that particular crop." Payments will be for 2003 or 2004 losses, based on which year had the greatest loss with farmers receiving either 65 or 60 percent of the established price depending upon whether they had or didn't have crop insurance. Idaho FSA State Director Wayne Hammond, says there is a cap on payments but there is no waiting for national pro-rating. Hammond: "We won't pay them more than 95% of the value of their crop, but anybody who had a loss we will calculate payments for and they will be paid right away. We don't have to wait to figure out nationally if it's one million, or two million, or ten million." Again, sign up begins Monday with no end date yet set.. I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.