Extra crop insurance homework paid off last year

Falling yields, combined with falling crop prices, usually paint a disastrous profit picture. But in 2008, many farmers were able to lock in favorable prices for their crops, knowing that their crop insurance policies would help cover revenue losses. In some cases, Nebraska farmers experienced little or no yield loss, marketed soybeans for between $12 to $15 per bushel and still received crop insurance payments of $95 per acre or more, says Ruth Gerdes, a crop insurance agent with the Auburn Agency, Auburn, Neb. Gerdes says that the payouts vary, but 99 percent of her customers in the nine states she serves buy some type of revenue-based policies and reaped the benefits this year.