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Federal Crop Insurance Corporation
 
 
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The Federal Crop Insurance Corporation (FCIC) is a wholly-owned Government corporation managed by the Risk Management Agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. FCIC manages the Federal crop insurance program which provides U.S. farmers and agricultural entities with crop insurance
Crop insurance

Crop insurance is purchased by agricultural producers, including farmers, ranchers, and others to protect themselves against either the loss of their crops due to natural disasters, such as hail, drought, and floods, or the loss of revenue due to declines in the prices of agricultural commodities....
 protection.

was created by the United States Congress
United States Congress

The United States Congress is the Bicameralism legislature of the Federal government of the United States of the United States of America, consisting of two houses, the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives....
 in legislation that passed on February 16, 1938 (7 U.S.C.






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The Federal Crop Insurance Corporation (FCIC) is a wholly-owned Government corporation managed by the Risk Management Agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. FCIC manages the Federal crop insurance program which provides U.S. farmers and agricultural entities with crop insurance
Crop insurance

Crop insurance is purchased by agricultural producers, including farmers, ranchers, and others to protect themselves against either the loss of their crops due to natural disasters, such as hail, drought, and floods, or the loss of revenue due to declines in the prices of agricultural commodities....
 protection.

Agency history

FCIC was created by the United States Congress
United States Congress

The United States Congress is the Bicameralism legislature of the Federal government of the United States of the United States of America, consisting of two houses, the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives....
 in legislation that passed on February 16, 1938 (7 U.S.C. 1501.). The legislation was created in response to the economic difficulties brought to the U.S. farming industry by the Great Depression
Great Depression

File:International depression.pngThe Great Depression was a worldwide economic Recession starting in most places in 1929 and ending at different times in the 1930s or early 1940s for different countries....
 and the weather-related catastrophe of the Dust Bowl
Dust Bowl

The Dust Bowl or the Dirty Thirties was a period of severe dust storms causing major ecological and agriculture damage to United States and Canada prairie lands from 1930 to 1936 ....
. On September 26, 1980, the program was expanded through Public Law 96-365.

Initially, participation in FCIC was voluntary. However, insurance premiums were subsidized by the U.S. government as a means of encouraging participation in the FCIC program. This changed with the Federal Crop Insurance Reform Act of 1994, which required farmers to participate in the program in order to be eligible for deficiency payments related to certain FCIC programs. Mandatory participation was repealed in 1996.

An independent office designed to supervise and monitor FCIC activities was mandated in the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 (P.L.104-127). The Agriculture Risk Protection Act of 2000 (ARPA) further amended FCIC’s activities by offering a wider selection of insurance-related risk management tools to farmers and agricultural entities.

Financial claims

Since 1980, FCIC recorded $43.6 billion in total claims, averaging approximately $1.7 billion in losses per year. Three-quarters of FCIC claims result three weather-related disasters – drought, excess moisture, and hail – with the remaining claims divided among 27 different causes, including crop-damaging frost and tornados.

Biotech coverage expansion

In September 2008, the U.S. Department of Agriculture approved the expansion of the FCIC’s risk management program to include agricultural producers involved in the planting and harvesting of certain biotech corn
Maize

Maize , known as corn in some countries, is a cereal domesticated in Mesoamerica and subsequently spread throughout the American continents....
 hybrid seeds that are designed to be resistant to damage from lepidopteron pests (including moths and their larvae) and below-ground corn rootworm damage. The biotech corn hybrid seeds must also show tolerance to certain herbicides. FCIC coverage for the biotech corn hybrid seeds goes into effect in 2009.

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