An education tool is available from the North Dakota State University Extension Service for evaluating certain options under the commodity title of the Agricultural Act of 2014 (farm bill).

Producers may elect to enroll in the Price Loss Coverage (PLC) program or the county Agricultural Risk Coverage (ARC) shallow loss revenue program on a crop by crop basis within each Farm Service Agency farm number.

“Producers may choose to keep their existing base acres or reallocate base acres using their 2009 through 2012 crop history,” says Andrew Swenson, NDSU Extension farm management specialist. “Producers also can update payment yields on a crop by crop basis.”

The program, available at www.ag.ndsu.edu/farmmanagement/farm-bill, will assist producers with these decisions, given their national average marketing year price and county average yield projections.

“The program does not consider the individual farm level ARC option or the possible benefits of the Supplemental Coverage Option crop insurance available with PLC enrollment,” Swanson says. “It should be emphasized that there is plenty of time to evaluate the farm bill options because these decisions do not need to be finalized for several months.

NDSU Agriculture Communication – March 28, 2014