After recent severe flooding in the region, the majority of Parkland farmers and ag producers are dealing with widespread crop destruction and field disruption, on a scale that hasn't been seen in a very long time.
Ron Kostyshyn, Dauphin MLA and Manitoba's Agriculture Minister, recommends farmers and ag producers to review their MASC policies, or reach out to their local MASC office.
"Our first line of defence is crop insurance, and until we get some evidence-based information, we'll have some measurement how bad crops have been affected," said Kostyshyn.
Kostyshyn said MASC and AgriInsurance officials will, when it's safe to do so, start visiting farms and fields in the region to get a better picture of this disaster's scale for farmers. Until then, there's no way to accurately estimate damage totals.
One of the big concerns for this flood is unseeded acreage. The MASC seeding deadline for excess moisture coverage was June 20th. With recent rains and flooding making a lot of farmers unable to seed by that deadline, and now that ability getting pushed even further back, many Parkland farmers are worried.
"For the producers that weren't able to seed due to wet acres, there is a crop insurance premium, or opportunity of a premium, where they would receive $75 an acre for compensation because they were unable to seed, so that's one of many programs...given the damage that exists, we have no straight answer of what's going to become of it, but obviously crop insurance agents will be out, doing an assessment," said Kostyshyn.
For more details, click here to visit MASC's webpage on excess moisture insurance. If you have any other questions or concerns about unseeded acreage and excess moisture insurance, call your local MASC office.
