FLAG Presented at the 16th Annual Iowa Organic Conference
FLAG Attorney Stephen Carpenter attended the 16th Annual Iowa Organic Conference in Des Moines, Iowa on November 16. Stephen presented at a Crop Insurance for Organic Farmers workshop with Nicole Cook and Mark Gutierrez of USDA’s Risk Management Agency. Stephen discussed how crop insurance works in general and highlighted some particular ways that recent changes in crop insurance – like the relatively new Whole Farm Revenue Protection – might be useful to organic farmers. Stephen also discussed some of the possible disputes that can arise between organic farmers and crop insurance providers, the effect on organic certification of pesticide drifting onto organic farms, and the way that problem is treated under current crop insurance policies. He also discussed the particular problems organic farmers face when their farm is flooded – as happened to a number of organic farmers in Iowa in September of this year.
