September 8, 2022 • 37 mins
Michael Gomes of Topcon Agriculture leads a panel discussion about how recent changes to RMA's Loss Adjusters Manual makes it easier for specialty crop producers to obtain insurance, report their annual production, and file a claim.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Topcon talks,
agriculture.
My name's Mike go.
I lead the strategic businessdevelopment function here at
Topcon agriculture and I'mtoday's guest host.
And we have quite a show for youtoday.
Really looking forward to it.
We're gonna talk a little bitabout crop insurance and some of
the most recent changes to cropinsurance to make it easier and
(00:38):
more streamlined.
And, uh, we've got a, a really aknockout panel of guest today.
We've got Marsha Buner theadministrator for U S D A's risk
management association, as wellas Brad Meyer, client engagement
lead at Maya data and JeremyWilson, a farmer from Newton,
Illinois, uh, amongst otherthings.
(00:59):
And so, uh, really lookingforward to today's episode.
And so currently 85% of uscropland falls under some sort
of crop insurance or riskmanagement product.
And recently there have beensome changes in the loss
adjustment manual process inorder to enable and to make that
(01:21):
workflow a little bit easier andto create value as well as ease
of use for farmers and cropinsurance professionals alike.
And so today all three of ourguests have some level of crop
insurance experience, andthey're, it's gonna be a very
interesting conversation, Marsha, as, uh, leading the RMA for
(01:41):
crop insurance.
Do you want to tell the audiencea little bit about, uh, yourself
as well as, uh, how you see someof these things coming together?
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Sure.
My name is Marsha bunker.
I am the U S D A's RMAadministrator, commonly referred
to as crop insurance.
I have a background going backto 1982 when I graduated from
Augustana university in Siouxfalls, South Dakota.
I married my high schoolsweetheart, and we have a 1200
(02:13):
acre row crop farm of corn beansin the upper Midwest in the
Southeast corner of South Dakota.
We also have a livestockoperation, a 200 head cow calf
operation, and we are a typicalmom pop type of operation.
So I balance my career with alsoour livelihood and then has been
(02:35):
40 years of lots of experienceand, you know, some heartache.
But in this role as the RMAadministrator, I'm seeing a
whole new side of the cropinsurance industry, um, working
with AIPs, working, um, withsome individuals at RMA that are
(02:56):
incredibly awesome dedicatedcareer employees that truly care
about farmers and giving themthe tools that they need to
mitigate risk weather nature isnot controlled by anyone.
And so army is here to helpminimize the losses that are
suffered because of catastrophicweather events.
(03:18):
But I also think crop insuranceis a way to assist the farmer
when he's making, um, decisionswith marketing lenders almost
always require at least whereI'm from that you have crop
insurance at a certain level,and by using your crop
(03:39):
insurance, you're not only ableto mitigate that risk, but also
market more effectively tohopefully make a little money.
So that was probably the longversion of my background.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
That's okay.
It's always great to hear thatpeople that are in positions of
policy are actually have realworld experience.
And you've got it both from theproducer side, as well as from,
uh, as well as from the agencyside.
And so to me, that's why youlook absolutely like, um, a very
highly qualified Canada and, anda, and an excellent choice in
(04:14):
this position.
And so, uh, makes a ton of senseto me next up, uh, is a, is
another farmer, uh, JeremyWilson.
Jeremy, can you tell us a littlebit about who you are and how
you got on today's panel?
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Yeah.
Thank you, Mike.
Uh, Jeremy Wilson.
Um, I live in SoutheasternIllinois, been involved in the
precision ag industry, actuallyall of agriculture.
Um, since about 1995, when Iactually worked for a crop
insurance company, ironicallyenough, and they dove into the
precision ag business in 96 and,and they brought me with them
(04:47):
and did that up until 99 andwent home and to work ag retail
and figured out precision agwas, was gonna be very critical
in that business, which I neverleft precision after that.
And, um, just recently joined aggateway as the executive vice
president chief operatingofficer, um, in the fall of 2018
(05:09):
, my father come to me and said,I've heard you speak for 20
years.
And you said, when you grow up,you're gonna be a farmer.
So are you gonna grow up or am Igonna line it up?
And, um, as of, uh, aboutDecember 1st, 2018, me and my
cousin bought my dad out, we runabout 1200 acres of corn
soybeans and winter wheat aswell.
(05:30):
We both have cattle as well.
We raise cattle very similar toMarsha's background, ironically,
number of acres and number ofhead between both of us, um, are
almost identical between the twoof us.
We have around 150 to hundred 75head of cow calf operation as
well, just been doing a lot ofwork in the whole data space,
(05:51):
um, and, and how we can collectdata and streamline processes.
And, and I'm really excited tobe on here and talk about, you
know, how the changes, how thatcan impact me and, and, and
other farmers like myself tomake this whole reporting
process simpler.
Um, we seem to have done it thesame way for the last, I don't
know, picked the number ofyears, and it's really exciting
(06:12):
to, to see some opportunities.
And some technologies has comeinto the farm to streamline
processes for me, of how I, youknow, work and, and process and
calculate harvested bushels andyield per acre and how that data
streams into other decisionmaking processes on my farm.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
Thanks and, and routing out our panel today.
We have Brad Meyer from, uh,Maya data.
Brad, can you tell us a littlebit about who you are and, and,
uh, what you're up to?
Speaker 4 (06:41):
Yeah, absolutely.
Thanks Mike.
Uh, so I'm Brad Meyer clientsuccess lead for my ag data.
Give a little bit of backgroundon myself, uh, grew up on a, a
small farm in Michigan, andunfortunately we lost the farm
due to those hardships thateverybody talks about.
So kind of going through, uh,eventually got into crop
insurance and, and, you know,saw the, uh, the, how important
(07:04):
that really is.
I mean, from real lifeexperience.
So came from the adjusting sideof things and, uh, you know,
just kind of saw the strugglesthat the American farmer would
actually go through, um, interms of, you know, those, those
losses.
I mean, having thoseinteractions during those times,
I mean, I, I just saw the needand, uh, the, the fit for, you
(07:25):
know, that data streamingcollection process.
And, uh, that kinda led me to mydata and, and to streamline that
process, make it easier for afarmer to, you know, basically
push their data over to the U SD a and to streamline that
process a little bit.
So that's a, a little bit of mybackground and, and kind of
where it came from.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
Fantastic.
Thanks very much.
Marsha, can you give us a littlebit of background on crop
insurance and how we got towhere we are today?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Certainly Congress first authorized federal crop
insurance in the thirties, andmy dad was born in the thirties.
So I do even have some firsthandstories from him.
It also, you know, was part ofthe great depression.
I mean, it was probably veryawful, but legislatively, it
(08:14):
became what we know as federalcrop insurance in the thirties
and crop insurance remained anexperiment basically until the
passage of the federal cropinsurance act of 1980.
The modern era of crop insurancewas marked by the introduction
of the public privatepartnership between the us
(08:34):
government and private insurancecompanies in 2018, the farm bill
strengthened the crop insuranceby adding new products and
directing research to thedevelopment of products for
additional crops and modifyingexisting programs in 2021.
You know, we're, we're almostprobably a year out, but here we
(08:55):
are today more than 460 millionacres of farmland back in 2021
were protected through thefederal crop insurance program.
Farmers, taxpayers in oureconomy, all benefit from the
farm safety net provided by cropinsurance.
When confronted with yield orrevenue losses, farmers use crop
insurance indemnities tofinancially recover from natural
(09:17):
disasters and a volatile marketfluctuation.
They can pay their bankers, theycan pay their bills, they can go
to their seed dealers and, andget them current, pay their
landlords.
It's, um, a huge machine.
And without it, a lot of thefarmers, even since, since the
eighties, wouldn't be heretoday.
(09:39):
I like to remind people that ina farmer's life cycle, as a
farmer, he only gets about 50 to60 tries at this.
And every year is different.
He cannot predict what's gonnahappen from year to year in that
50 or 60 year cycle.
(10:00):
So when I hear stories of like2019, which was very similar in
our area as well, much, didn'tget planted, but through crop
insurance, we all are still heretoday.
So it has been a huge evolution.
Unfortunately, it came as aresult of the dust bowl and the
depression, but I'm glad that itwas implemented back then, and
(10:23):
that we have evolved to wherewe're at today.
Speaker 4 (10:27):
I was just gonna add, you know, the national security
element of this as well, too.
I mean, having a safe and stablefood supply is very important
also from a national securitystandpoint.
I mean, Marsha, you talked alittle bit about guessing and
being able to predict things, Imean, who would've thought that
there was gonna be a war, youknow, coming into 2022, I mean,
just farmers, I mean, they'reindividual small businesses and
(10:49):
you just never can tell what'sgonna actually happen.
I mean, from it beinggeopolitical standpoint or
whether related events, uh, tofluctuations in the marketplace,
I mean, it just, all of thosethings factored into it and, you
know, the, just the expansion ofthe crop insurance program is
just so hugely important to theAmerican farmer.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
And we can certainly see that crop insurance has
become a, a risk management toolthat the vast majority of
American agriculturalists areusing today.
And so very helpful stuff.
Marsha, can you give us a littlebit of background on, I mean,
we've talked a lot about cropinsurance and the ability to, to
mitigate the financial risk, um,of weather and some of those
(11:32):
things, but do you want to talka little bit about, um, where
you see the future of cropinsurance going and some maybe
how some of these most recentchanges are starting to, uh, uh,
to fit into this year?
Speaker 2 (11:44):
So RMA is here to help with that in exploring ways
to produce even more food thanever before, and also to provide
the kinds of policies that myhusband has the opportunity to
access with specialty crops,organic crops, those crops that
(12:04):
we see in the grocery store allthe time RMA does offer a number
of specialty crop policies, butI, I believe there's room to
expand upon those there's roomto improve the coverage and
elevate those crops.
We're also looking at ways tomitigate climate change through
conservation practices.
(12:25):
You know, we're gonna be talkingenrolling out in 2023, and we've
already made that announcementwith double cropping to look at
ways to produce more food,helping assisting the organic
industry with some incentives.
There we've come off of twoyears of pandemic cover crop
(12:46):
assistance, which was verysuccessful.
Um, you know, the, the data willbe very helpful in the years to
come.
Um, but you know, it's still inits infancy stages because we,
we need more data.
But when I talk to producers outin the country that are
implementing conservation typesof practices, like cover crops,
(13:07):
they are seeing the benefits.
And that's what it's all about.
It's what makes sense for thefarmer.
But the other piece of this isthat the private public
relationship that we have, whichis very unique to government,
um, we partner with AIP and cropinsurance agents.
Many of my sister agencies havelarge staff.
(13:28):
You know, when you look at FSANRCS, they number 10,000 plus in
each of those agencies and theygo, well, you have a small
agency Meria, you only have 400.
And I say, oh, I don't think youwanna, um, discount though.
All of the crop insurance agentsthat are out there, there are
13,000 of those agents out onthe ground, and they are very
(13:50):
valuable in implementing androlling out the new products,
the new, um, policies that RMApushes out.
So I think we're gonna do a lotof tweaking to answer your
questions to what's existing,but I think we're gonna also be
exploring a lot of new andinnovative types of concepts
with regards to the crops thatmaybe haven't historically
(14:12):
always been able to participatein RMA.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Brad, can you tell us a little bit about, uh, what you
see and, and maybe one of themost recent changes you've seen
in the crop insurance processhere recently?
Speaker 4 (14:26):
Yeah, absolutely.
So one, one change that I haveseen is for, uh, the change from
the loss adjustment manual toaccept electronic records of
grain cart data.
Um, I think that is gonnastreamline the data collection
for producer and also makes iteasier for producers to settle
their claims by utilizing thatinformation, um, just really
(14:48):
streamlining that process andmaking it a lot easier.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Now, Jeremy, you've been working with at gateway and
looking at this process for anumber of years.
Can you help us understand fromthe farmer perspective, how you
see these changes, uh, makingyour life easier?
Speaker 3 (15:04):
Absolutely.
Mike, you know, I'm gonna showmy age.
Yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna showmy age a little bit, but I, I
believe it was 2011.
Uh, we worked with a group ofAIP to define the calibration
process for yield monitors, cuzwe were exploring, looking at,
you know, yield data tostreamline, you know, claims and
(15:25):
losses.
And my excitement was prettyhigh there and, and we're moving
the needle and, and we did, Imean, that was an important
piece, but you know, with thismovement of, of accepting this
grain cart data, that that's abig deal for me.
I've been using that technologynow for two or three years and,
and the quality of my yield datahas increased exponentially, but
(15:47):
the amount of time it takes meto record and, and summarize
what the production was off ofevery field has probably been
cut by at least a half, if nottwo thirds.
And now the ability of this datato flow straight to my loss
adjuster for settling claimsmoves it to another level
because my grain cart data I'mnot gonna lie year after year is
(16:11):
probably less than 1% error ofwhat we're actually delivering
to the elevator.
And it is, you know, if a growerchooses to take that extra time,
uh, like we choose to do, Imean, we got a full log of, of
every field that, that graincome from.
What was that total production?
What was the moisture coming offof that?
The accuracy of my claimsincreases, but also the
(16:34):
timeliness of getting that done.
And if we go back to my firstyear, farming 2019 was the worst
year of my life.
We didn't plan a single thingtill June.
We didn't get much rain in Julyor August.
And, and I was excited that Ifinally had some corn that beat
110 when I could have sold atall in August to you for about
75 bushel, cuz it looked like itwas burned up and, and crop
(16:56):
insurance was an important tool.
It got me through 2019 that gotme to 2020 that healed a
majority of my sins from 19.
And you know, that was animportant piece.
And I still remember the processI went through and settling that
claim.
I, I had list after list of allthese records of, of what we
went through and you know, thenthe process of going and
crossing that back over to scaletickets that went to the
(17:17):
elevator.
I, I I'd been a loss adjuster.
I knew that was the policy.
So I, I just smiled and said,yes, yes ma'am we'll, we'll keep
it.
We'll get it.
We'll I know what you're goingthrough.
Don't sweat it.
I've been there.
And, and just the thought ofstreamlining that process not
only saves me amount of time,but the level of accuracy we
move to in these claims and youknow what, I don't buy insurance
(17:40):
cause I wanna use it.
I wanna buy it so that if I haveto use it, I can make it to the
next season.
And being able to get thatprocess done is,
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Is incredibly important.
Absolutely, absolutely.
That that makes a ton of sense.
And so one of the things thatJeremy was talking about was the
ability to get the data from thenon stationary scales.
And that's the big change thisyear in the loss adjustment
manual, uh, in, in the fact thatwe can now accept the data from
(18:09):
the non stationary scales or thegrain carts.
Marsha, can you talk to us alittle bit about why RMA made
some of these revisions andwhat's the thinking behind it?
Speaker 2 (18:20):
I will give that a try.
You know, when my husband and Istarted farming in 1982, we just
did not have the technology.
I mean, I think if you had, uh,an eight function calculator,
that was probably the extent ofit.
Um, it was before cell phones,that kind of thing.
And technology has reallysurpassed many, many things.
(18:43):
I mean, I think as a humanfactor, it's surpassed a lot of
things that we can, we can'thardly seem to keep up with.
And so things like nonstationary grain scales, um, it
only makes sense.
I mean it's accurate, that'sproven out time and time again,
when the information goes into agrain cart, sometimes it's just
(19:04):
haul to town.
Sometimes it's put in a bin fora short period of time and then
haul to town and when you get itto the elevator, it matches.
So why wouldn't we also acceptthat kind of record keeping and
the, the ease of it for thefarmer.
I can remember keeping track ona little notebook when I'm
sitting in the combine about howmany loads I filled and you
(19:26):
know, and then of course youlose track, which field were you
were even in.
Whereas that grain cart istracking that on a GPS type of
system where that wagon sat andhow much got dumped in there.
And it's all right there for theease of the farmer.
You know, I, I, I'm not familiarwith that specific type of
(19:46):
technology at my farm.
We're not quite there yet, but Ithink that's what RMA looked at.
There was a lot of datacollected through that system
and the accuracy of it was spoton.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
Excellent.
And so, uh, really appreciatethat perspective.
So Brad, how does this additionof being able to accept data
from non stationary skills?
How does that impact cropinsurance agents or insurance
adjusters?
And does it make anything easierfor them?
Speaker 4 (20:16):
Um, yeah, I mean it makes it a lot easier to be able
to report, um, informationcoming in.
And if I could, let me just kindof take one step back with crop
insurance, a farmer has toreport what they actually plant
to the U S D a for thesedifferent farm programs by C,
which is the common land unit.
So it's those field boundariesthat the FSA office says that
(20:39):
that field is kind ofstreamlining.
That process makes it, you know,with my data.
Um, it makes it a little biteasier to report that data
directly to the U S D a and thenbeing able to tie that grain
that's harvested off of thoseC's and tying it back just makes
the process that much easier.
And the reporting process to theS D a for the acreage report is
(21:01):
a very analog process, verysimilar to the production
reporting.
Also again, a very analogprocess agents and adjusters
alike.
They have to, uh, make sure thatthe production that they're
taking is accurate and they haveto, a lot of times track down
that information.
I mean, I've heard a lot oftimes where an agent would be
trying to get ahold of aproducer and, you know, let's
(21:23):
say the producer is off onvacation or, you know, once the
harvest is done, they just kindof vanish sometimes.
So a lot of times it's difficultfor the agent to be able to get
that information back, to finishthe reporting process, very
similar to an adjuster, anadjuster would go, and they
would have to take thatinformation, um, off tie it back
to the unit that it goes to.
(21:44):
A lot of times that productionis co-mingled across fields and
or diluting that production overfrom good fields over bad fields
, uh, that doesn't always help.
I mean, having an accurate, uh,production history, it is more
beneficial to the producer onthe adjuster side of things.
You know, the harvestedproduction talked about
(22:05):
settlement sheets.
I mean, that's usually what mostpeople use, but a lot of times
grain bins, right, an adjusterwould go and measure a grain bin
and have to determine how muchgrain is in that bin to settle a
claim.
Well, some of the problems withthat is, is you could have
issues with those calculations.
You could measure the conewrong, you could measure the
test weight, wrong moisture, forinstance.
(22:27):
So Marsha, you talked a littlebit about load logs, you know,
kind of in sitting in thetractor and writing those things
down, having thatcontemporaneous load log.
I mean, you nailed it, you, youmight miss a load.
You might miss where thatproduction's coming from from
that field.
So by having those grain cartswith that GPS sensor in it, you
(22:47):
know, like the GT five 60, forinstance, which has the GPS
tracker, it's got the, uh,moisture sensor right in there
as well, too.
So being able to track thatinformation and tie it directly
back to where that productionwas harvested from is gonna make
everybody's life easier.
The farmer, the adjuster, allthe way to the agent just makes
(23:10):
it that much easier.
So, um, it just way moreaccurate determination of that
yield, which is gonna make it,so the producer has a higher APH
as well, too.
So,
Speaker 1 (23:20):
And in that case, the APH would be their average
production history.
So the idea is, is that throughthe accuracy, they're always
getting the most accurateinformation and, and the best
information about theiroperation, right?
Brad,
Speaker 4 (23:34):
The approved production history.
So yeah, it would be thataverage over a period of time,
you know, you gotta have atleast five years of, of actual
production history.
And, um, just having thathistory there creates that, uh,
that guarantee, which is gonnagive that protection to the
farmer.
So again, just having it all tieback directly to where that
frame originated is just, itmakes it that much easier.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
Perfect.
Well, so it, it sure soundsgood, but Jeremy, I mean, you've
been living this world for along time, is it as good as it
all sounds
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Absolutely is, um, you know, the GT five 60 was a
huge step in the right directionof getting to where we're at
today and I've owned one ofthem, I don't know, since a long
time.
And, you know, and as wecontinue to move forward and,
and looking at, you know, thesmart cart and, and how we're
(24:25):
connecting a GT five 60 and, andtransferring data into tap to,
to go ahead and automate theseprocesses even more, the easy
button is more insight than it'sever been from, from a lot of
levels, whether it's from, youknow, completing this reporting
that we're talking about,whether I'm the case of a loss,
or just even in my APHreporting, you know, of, of
(24:47):
having that in a streamlinedprocess that creates one report.
I might finally become thefarmer that the adjuster doesn't
just scratch his head and say,all right, let's just figure
this out.
And that would be, that would bean exciting time um,
because I do my level best everytime.
You know, when, when we knowthere's a loss to make sure it's
all in one bin and, and notifythe adjuster and get the tape on
(25:11):
the bin and, or get him here tomeasure it.
But, you know, you, Bradthrew out a word of co-mingled
production.
And that used to be a word thatought to be struck from all of
our vocabularies, because thatwas the most evil word you could
hear, whether you were a lossadjuster was a farmer, is how
did you ever solve thatco-mingled production problem.
And in a lot of cases youdidn't, and when you couldn't
(25:34):
solve that problem, nine timesout of 10 led to there not being
a loss or not helping me get theassistance I needed to get
through that season from aproduct that I'd purchased to
get through that and, and how wecan streamline these processes
to eliminate that make the lifeeasier.
And, you know, some of thetechnologies that Topcon has
brought us through this, youknow, GT five 60 and, and the
(25:57):
smart cart is gonna even make itsimpler.
And it's really exciting, youknow, I assume my whole career
talking about, you know, ifyou're gonna work with farmers,
you need to meet'em wherethey're at on the technology
curve.
And it's really exciting to see,you know, RMA taking some steps
to begin to meet me where I'm aton the technology curve and
utilizing the technology.
I didn't buy it for cropinsurance reporting.
(26:19):
I bought it because there wasother value in my operation and
what I wanted to do with thatdata and how I was gonna make
money with that data.
It's incredibly exciting to knownow that that same technology is
gonna port over into the cropinsurance side, through RMA to
streamline those processes andmake it simple.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Perfect.
Now, Brad, do you wanna describefor us a little bit about how
Maya data and Topcon worktogether to create some of this
streamlining?
Speaker 4 (26:46):
Yeah, absolutely.
So with my, a data, you couldthink of us as the, uh, TurboTax
of acreage reporting.
So, you know, be able to takeplanted data, whether that be
from, uh, a planter, you know,precision ag, or whether that be
C L U, like I talked aboutearlier, just kind of making it
so you have the acreage reportand be able to push that to the
(27:06):
U S D a for the first step,creating that acreage report,
helping that process with ourpartnership, with Topcon, what
we can do with cloud basedreporting with a tap account, if
harvested information is in tapthrough those GT five 60 S
you'll easily be able to makethat cloud connection and then
bring those grain cart, loadlogs directly into Maya data by
(27:29):
that cloud connection.
So it's very easy process.
It's very automated when thatcloud connection is established.
And again, it's tying itdirectly back to that planted
shape, making it a lot easierfor that production report to be
generated, to be able to give tothe adjuster to the agent, to
whomever needs that productionreporting process.
(27:50):
So just a, a very, uh, simplecouple clicks bringing in that
cloud connection and that tyingit back to that planted shape.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Perfect.
Well, really appreciate thatexplanation.
Um, helps everybody understandhow the data layers are flowing
out of, out of, uh, Jeremy'sgrain card and then in, in,
through, um, into tap and thenin, through my, a data, and then
eventually being able to besubmitted, um, into, uh, uh, to
(28:19):
both crop insurance agents, uh,the AIPs, as well as to RMA,
right.
Uh, potentially in remittance ofthose claims.
Now, um, I, one of the thingsthat I see that we see on the
landscape is, uh, specificallyis just how responsive the RMA
has been.
And, and Marsha, we see that,um, you know, that you are
(28:41):
really driving change or, uh,change towards farmers in the
RMA.
And the fact that you're, you'retrying to do a adapt to things
like, like these kinds ofthings, being able to accept
data from non stationary scalesor even, uh, help to look at the
lo at the potential loss of, ofin season application of
(29:02):
nitrogen, some of those kinds ofthings.
Um, Marsha, is there anythingelse you want to tell us a
little bit about where you see,um, RMA headed and crop
insurance headed into 22 and 23,or what you really see on the
horizon is next for RMA and forcrop insurance?
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Certainly there's a number of initiatives that we've
been working on and that we haverecently announced, like I
referred to earlier, the organictransition, also the assistance
for organic producers that werefer to as Toga.
There's also been changes to thewhole farm revenue protection
(29:39):
policy.
We've increased the limits bydoubling it so that we are not
excluding, um, individuals basedupon size, but we've also done
on the other spectrum with microfarms for those small producers,
with the micro farm policy thathas been rolled out, um, in the
last year or so that we haveincreased that limit as well.
(30:01):
Because with the feedback fromstakeholders, from producers
that the initial cap at ahundred thousand dollars was
just not really reaching thetargeted audience.
So we've increased that limit to300, 350,000, um, somewhere in
there.
So those are some of thosechanges.
The other thing that we've madechanges to is the reporting for
(30:27):
vertically integrated types ofoperations.
We used to require third partyverification of production up
front.
We've moved that to the back end, which allows easier reporting
for those producers using wholefarm.
They're allowed to now use theirown records.
They don't need to have the AIPcome out and do a pre-harvest
(30:51):
type of appraisal.
We included a number of crops inthose changes, and we have those
listed out on our RMA website.
And I think it's just an everevolving process.
We love to hear feedback fromgrowers and their grower
organizations, because they'rethe ones that are where the
(31:12):
rubber meets the road astechnology changes as production
types of things change.
As we add more crops, that inputis valuable.
And along with the types oftechnology that we're talking
about today with ag data RMAlives and breathes by data, and
that's what continues to makecrop insurance so sound and what
(31:38):
the taxpayer wants to see thatthis is a very concentrated
effort to use science, tosubstantiate all of the policies
that we are implementing.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Fantastic, and really salute, um, the changes and, and
really the direction that you'reworking to push, uh, RMA, uh, in
being more grower responsive,and really aligning to the
workflow.
Really appreciate that.
And, uh, so Brad, from yourperspective, is there anything
else that our listers shouldknow?
Speaker 4 (32:13):
Uh, yeah, absolutely.
So, you know, one thing that Ijust kind of wanted to just to
circle back to one comment thatMarsha made is just making this
program viable, making sure thateverything is correct, you know,
fraud, waste and abuse getsthrown around a lot, right?
So the fraud waste and abusewithin crop insurance is a very
small amount compared that tolet's say, Medicare, Medicaid,
(32:35):
the fraud waste and abuse couldbe 20, 25%, even higher.
Some, some cases and the fraudwaste and abuse within crop
insurance is very small.
It's like under 2%.
And with these new advantages byusing data, for instance, like
Marsha had just talked about itis gonna make that even less.
I mean, just having accuratedetermination of yield from the
(32:57):
smart cards, precision ag dataand the planting, you know,
ensuring actual planting versusthe C L U I mean, all those
things are gonna ask help theprogram succeed long term.
So I think that was just onething I kind of wanted to point
out, uh, just kind of hearingthat comment.
The other thing is, is how cangrowers take advantage of these
changes?
So, one thing that I would checkis see if their indicator on
(33:21):
their grain card can supportsome of these things, talk with
their agents and their adjustersand how they can work together
to streamline this process.
See if their crop insurancecompanies will be able to accept
this data electronically.
That's a big thing.
Right?
Finally, I, I think I would justpush growers to check out crop
reporting.com, which is moreinformation about acres
(33:44):
reporting process and theproduction reporting process.
Um, talk kind of explains thepartnership that my ag data and
Topcon has and, and how you canbenefit by utilizing precision
ag data, um, and that reportingprocess so that I would direct
people that way to learn moreinformation.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
Perfect.
And so Brad, that was www dotcrop reporting, C R O P R E P O.
RT I N g.com.
Right.
Crop reporting.com.
Speaker 4 (34:15):
That's correct.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
Perfect, perfect, good stuff.
Really, really good stuff.
Jeremy, do you have any partingthoughts?
I mean, you've, you've, you'vebeen sitting on the sidelines
seeing a lot of this stuff asit's evolving, where do you see
this thing going?
I, I mean, are we, are wegetting traction?
Is it working?
Speaker 3 (34:35):
We're definitely getting traction.
And, and the first thing that Idon't wanna forget to save
before I end, so I'll say itnow.
So Marsha, thank you for yourrole in working to make my life
simpler because it's, it'sincredibly exciting to hear
that.
Like I said, once before, Idon't buy crop insurance because
I wanna use it, but the years Ido need to use it, I really need
(34:56):
to use it most likely.
And you know, my really onlyparting thought, you know, is
we've got growers or evenprecision ag practitioners,
agronomists, whoever may belistening to this is kind of
like Brad said, if, if you'renot doing it, ask the questions.
It would shock me that if a lotof the people, or maybe even
(35:17):
some of the growers, they maynot have the, the exact
indicator today to do what we'retalking about.
The scale head that's settingout there.
But in most cases, you know, ifyou've got a Digi star already,
you probably can add a five 60rather economically, and begin
that process of using thistechnology and make your life
simpler.
I mean, I can tell you, yes, Iknow I've got a day job too, but
(35:40):
it seems like I'm doing morebusy work on the farm than I
want to, which takes time awayfrom my family and doing the fun
things I wanna do.
And you know, all of thesethings that we've talked about,
the changes we've made, whetherit's on the front side of the
acreage reporting are the backside of the loss adjustment, you
know, side of this business, oreven APH reporting the tools and
(36:00):
technology are there to free upmore time to let me do the
things I wanna do.
That's fun, not the busy work.
And if you haven't looked atthat technology, take the 15
minutes outta your life and askthe question, uh, because I
think it'll, well, I don't thinkI know I've felt it firsthand.
It's freed up time for me that Ididn't have to spend doing
(36:21):
paperwork processing loadrecords and Marcia your comment
about writing them in a book.
We still have one driver thatwrites everything in a book, and
it's really entertaining to seehow sometimes how accurate they
are and sometimes how inaccurateyet they are.
You know, it, it's just excitingto see where technology went.
(36:42):
I'm just life part of,
Speaker 1 (36:54):
Well of I'd all three of you, um, as our guest today.
And that would be Jeremy Wilson,um, from Newton, Illinois, uh,
Brad Meyer from Maya data.
And most importantly, MarshaBunger the administrator of the
U S D A's RMA risk managementagency.
And, um, really appreciateeverybody in the time that
(37:16):
they've spent with us.
Thank you, dear listeners for,uh, the time that you've spent
tuning in.
If you've enjoyed this episode,remember to like share and
subscribe to Topcon talks,agriculture on Spotify, apple
podcast, Amazon music, orwherever you get your podcast.
Thank you very much.
(37:36):
And we look forward to here intri next episode,
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Topcon talks,
agriculture.
My name's Mike go.
I lead the strategic businessdevelopment function here at
Topcon agriculture and I'mtoday's guest host.
And we have quite a show for youtoday.
Really looking forward to it.
We're gonna talk a little bitabout crop insurance and some of
the most recent changes to cropinsurance to make it easier and
(00:38):
more streamlined.
And, uh, we've got a, a really aknockout panel of guest today.
We've got Marsha Buner theadministrator for U S D A's risk
management association, as wellas Brad Meyer, client engagement
lead at Maya data and JeremyWilson, a farmer from Newton,
Illinois, uh, amongst otherthings.
(00:59):
And so, uh, really lookingforward to today's episode.
And so currently 85% of uscropland falls under some sort
of crop insurance or riskmanagement product.
And recently there have beensome changes in the loss
adjustment manual process inorder to enable and to make that
(01:21):
workflow a little bit easier andto create value as well as ease
of use for farmers and cropinsurance professionals alike.
And so today all three of ourguests have some level of crop
insurance experience, andthey're, it's gonna be a very
interesting conversation, Marsha, as, uh, leading the RMA for
(01:41):
crop insurance.
Do you want to tell the audiencea little bit about, uh, yourself
as well as, uh, how you see someof these things coming together?
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Sure.
My name is Marsha bunker.
I am the U S D A's RMAadministrator, commonly referred
to as crop insurance.
I have a background going backto 1982 when I graduated from
Augustana university in Siouxfalls, South Dakota.
I married my high schoolsweetheart, and we have a 1200
(02:13):
acre row crop farm of corn beansin the upper Midwest in the
Southeast corner of South Dakota.
We also have a livestockoperation, a 200 head cow calf
operation, and we are a typicalmom pop type of operation.
So I balance my career with alsoour livelihood and then has been
(02:35):
40 years of lots of experienceand, you know, some heartache.
But in this role as the RMAadministrator, I'm seeing a
whole new side of the cropinsurance industry, um, working
with AIPs, working, um, withsome individuals at RMA that are
(02:56):
incredibly awesome dedicatedcareer employees that truly care
about farmers and giving themthe tools that they need to
mitigate risk weather nature isnot controlled by anyone.
And so army is here to helpminimize the losses that are
suffered because of catastrophicweather events.
(03:18):
But I also think crop insuranceis a way to assist the farmer
when he's making, um, decisionswith marketing lenders almost
always require at least whereI'm from that you have crop
insurance at a certain level,and by using your crop
(03:39):
insurance, you're not only ableto mitigate that risk, but also
market more effectively tohopefully make a little money.
So that was probably the longversion of my background.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
That's okay.
It's always great to hear thatpeople that are in positions of
policy are actually have realworld experience.
And you've got it both from theproducer side, as well as from,
uh, as well as from the agencyside.
And so to me, that's why youlook absolutely like, um, a very
highly qualified Canada and, anda, and an excellent choice in
(04:14):
this position.
And so, uh, makes a ton of senseto me next up, uh, is a, is
another farmer, uh, JeremyWilson.
Jeremy, can you tell us a littlebit about who you are and how
you got on today's panel?
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Yeah.
Thank you, Mike.
Uh, Jeremy Wilson.
Um, I live in SoutheasternIllinois, been involved in the
precision ag industry, actuallyall of agriculture.
Um, since about 1995, when Iactually worked for a crop
insurance company, ironicallyenough, and they dove into the
precision ag business in 96 and,and they brought me with them
(04:47):
and did that up until 99 andwent home and to work ag retail
and figured out precision agwas, was gonna be very critical
in that business, which I neverleft precision after that.
And, um, just recently joined aggateway as the executive vice
president chief operatingofficer, um, in the fall of 2018
(05:09):
, my father come to me and said,I've heard you speak for 20
years.
And you said, when you grow up,you're gonna be a farmer.
So are you gonna grow up or am Igonna line it up?
And, um, as of, uh, aboutDecember 1st, 2018, me and my
cousin bought my dad out, we runabout 1200 acres of corn
soybeans and winter wheat aswell.
(05:30):
We both have cattle as well.
We raise cattle very similar toMarsha's background, ironically,
number of acres and number ofhead between both of us, um, are
almost identical between the twoof us.
We have around 150 to hundred 75head of cow calf operation as
well, just been doing a lot ofwork in the whole data space,
(05:51):
um, and, and how we can collectdata and streamline processes.
And, and I'm really excited tobe on here and talk about, you
know, how the changes, how thatcan impact me and, and, and
other farmers like myself tomake this whole reporting
process simpler.
Um, we seem to have done it thesame way for the last, I don't
know, picked the number ofyears, and it's really exciting
(06:12):
to, to see some opportunities.
And some technologies has comeinto the farm to streamline
processes for me, of how I, youknow, work and, and process and
calculate harvested bushels andyield per acre and how that data
streams into other decisionmaking processes on my farm.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
Thanks and, and routing out our panel today.
We have Brad Meyer from, uh,Maya data.
Brad, can you tell us a littlebit about who you are and, and,
uh, what you're up to?
Speaker 4 (06:41):
Yeah, absolutely.
Thanks Mike.
Uh, so I'm Brad Meyer clientsuccess lead for my ag data.
Give a little bit of backgroundon myself, uh, grew up on a, a
small farm in Michigan, andunfortunately we lost the farm
due to those hardships thateverybody talks about.
So kind of going through, uh,eventually got into crop
insurance and, and, you know,saw the, uh, the, how important
(07:04):
that really is.
I mean, from real lifeexperience.
So came from the adjusting sideof things and, uh, you know,
just kind of saw the strugglesthat the American farmer would
actually go through, um, interms of, you know, those, those
losses.
I mean, having thoseinteractions during those times,
I mean, I, I just saw the needand, uh, the, the fit for, you
(07:25):
know, that data streamingcollection process.
And, uh, that kinda led me to mydata and, and to streamline that
process, make it easier for afarmer to, you know, basically
push their data over to the U SD a and to streamline that
process a little bit.
So that's a, a little bit of mybackground and, and kind of
where it came from.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
Fantastic.
Thanks very much.
Marsha, can you give us a littlebit of background on crop
insurance and how we got towhere we are today?
Speaker 2 (07:53):
Certainly Congress first authorized federal crop
insurance in the thirties, andmy dad was born in the thirties.
So I do even have some firsthandstories from him.
It also, you know, was part ofthe great depression.
I mean, it was probably veryawful, but legislatively, it
(08:14):
became what we know as federalcrop insurance in the thirties
and crop insurance remained anexperiment basically until the
passage of the federal cropinsurance act of 1980.
The modern era of crop insurancewas marked by the introduction
of the public privatepartnership between the us
(08:34):
government and private insurancecompanies in 2018, the farm bill
strengthened the crop insuranceby adding new products and
directing research to thedevelopment of products for
additional crops and modifyingexisting programs in 2021.
You know, we're, we're almostprobably a year out, but here we
(08:55):
are today more than 460 millionacres of farmland back in 2021
were protected through thefederal crop insurance program.
Farmers, taxpayers in oureconomy, all benefit from the
farm safety net provided by cropinsurance.
When confronted with yield orrevenue losses, farmers use crop
insurance indemnities tofinancially recover from natural
(09:17):
disasters and a volatile marketfluctuation.
They can pay their bankers, theycan pay their bills, they can go
to their seed dealers and, andget them current, pay their
landlords.
It's, um, a huge machine.
And without it, a lot of thefarmers, even since, since the
eighties, wouldn't be heretoday.
(09:39):
I like to remind people that ina farmer's life cycle, as a
farmer, he only gets about 50 to60 tries at this.
And every year is different.
He cannot predict what's gonnahappen from year to year in that
50 or 60 year cycle.
(10:00):
So when I hear stories of like2019, which was very similar in
our area as well, much, didn'tget planted, but through crop
insurance, we all are still heretoday.
So it has been a huge evolution.
Unfortunately, it came as aresult of the dust bowl and the
depression, but I'm glad that itwas implemented back then, and
(10:23):
that we have evolved to wherewe're at today.
Speaker 4 (10:27):
I was just gonna add, you know, the national security
element of this as well, too.
I mean, having a safe and stablefood supply is very important
also from a national securitystandpoint.
I mean, Marsha, you talked alittle bit about guessing and
being able to predict things, Imean, who would've thought that
there was gonna be a war, youknow, coming into 2022, I mean,
just farmers, I mean, they'reindividual small businesses and
(10:49):
you just never can tell what'sgonna actually happen.
I mean, from it beinggeopolitical standpoint or
whether related events, uh, tofluctuations in the marketplace,
I mean, it just, all of thosethings factored into it and, you
know, the, just the expansion ofthe crop insurance program is
just so hugely important to theAmerican farmer.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
And we can certainly see that crop insurance has
become a, a risk management toolthat the vast majority of
American agriculturalists areusing today.
And so very helpful stuff.
Marsha, can you give us a littlebit of background on, I mean,
we've talked a lot about cropinsurance and the ability to, to
mitigate the financial risk, um,of weather and some of those
(11:32):
things, but do you want to talka little bit about, um, where
you see the future of cropinsurance going and some maybe
how some of these most recentchanges are starting to, uh, uh,
to fit into this year?
Speaker 2 (11:44):
So RMA is here to help with that in exploring ways
to produce even more food thanever before, and also to provide
the kinds of policies that myhusband has the opportunity to
access with specialty crops,organic crops, those crops that
(12:04):
we see in the grocery store allthe time RMA does offer a number
of specialty crop policies, butI, I believe there's room to
expand upon those there's roomto improve the coverage and
elevate those crops.
We're also looking at ways tomitigate climate change through
conservation practices.
(12:25):
You know, we're gonna be talkingenrolling out in 2023, and we've
already made that announcementwith double cropping to look at
ways to produce more food,helping assisting the organic
industry with some incentives.
There we've come off of twoyears of pandemic cover crop
(12:46):
assistance, which was verysuccessful.
Um, you know, the, the data willbe very helpful in the years to
come.
Um, but you know, it's still inits infancy stages because we,
we need more data.
But when I talk to producers outin the country that are
implementing conservation typesof practices, like cover crops,
(13:07):
they are seeing the benefits.
And that's what it's all about.
It's what makes sense for thefarmer.
But the other piece of this isthat the private public
relationship that we have, whichis very unique to government,
um, we partner with AIP and cropinsurance agents.
Many of my sister agencies havelarge staff.
(13:28):
You know, when you look at FSANRCS, they number 10,000 plus in
each of those agencies and theygo, well, you have a small
agency Meria, you only have 400.
And I say, oh, I don't think youwanna, um, discount though.
All of the crop insurance agentsthat are out there, there are
13,000 of those agents out onthe ground, and they are very
(13:50):
valuable in implementing androlling out the new products,
the new, um, policies that RMApushes out.
So I think we're gonna do a lotof tweaking to answer your
questions to what's existing,but I think we're gonna also be
exploring a lot of new andinnovative types of concepts
with regards to the crops thatmaybe haven't historically
(14:12):
always been able to participatein RMA.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Brad, can you tell us a little bit about, uh, what you
see and, and maybe one of themost recent changes you've seen
in the crop insurance processhere recently?
Speaker 4 (14:26):
Yeah, absolutely.
So one, one change that I haveseen is for, uh, the change from
the loss adjustment manual toaccept electronic records of
grain cart data.
Um, I think that is gonnastreamline the data collection
for producer and also makes iteasier for producers to settle
their claims by utilizing thatinformation, um, just really
(14:48):
streamlining that process andmaking it a lot easier.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
Now, Jeremy, you've been working with at gateway and
looking at this process for anumber of years.
Can you help us understand fromthe farmer perspective, how you
see these changes, uh, makingyour life easier?
Speaker 3 (15:04):
Absolutely.
Mike, you know, I'm gonna showmy age.
Yeah, I'm gonna, I'm gonna showmy age a little bit, but I, I
believe it was 2011.
Uh, we worked with a group ofAIP to define the calibration
process for yield monitors, cuzwe were exploring, looking at,
you know, yield data tostreamline, you know, claims and
(15:25):
losses.
And my excitement was prettyhigh there and, and we're moving
the needle and, and we did, Imean, that was an important
piece, but you know, with thismovement of, of accepting this
grain cart data, that that's abig deal for me.
I've been using that technologynow for two or three years and,
and the quality of my yield datahas increased exponentially, but
(15:47):
the amount of time it takes meto record and, and summarize
what the production was off ofevery field has probably been
cut by at least a half, if nottwo thirds.
And now the ability of this datato flow straight to my loss
adjuster for settling claimsmoves it to another level
because my grain cart data I'mnot gonna lie year after year is
(16:11):
probably less than 1% error ofwhat we're actually delivering
to the elevator.
And it is, you know, if a growerchooses to take that extra time,
uh, like we choose to do, Imean, we got a full log of, of
every field that, that graincome from.
What was that total production?
What was the moisture coming offof that?
The accuracy of my claimsincreases, but also the
(16:34):
timeliness of getting that done.
And if we go back to my firstyear, farming 2019 was the worst
year of my life.
We didn't plan a single thingtill June.
We didn't get much rain in Julyor August.
And, and I was excited that Ifinally had some corn that beat
110 when I could have sold atall in August to you for about
75 bushel, cuz it looked like itwas burned up and, and crop
(16:56):
insurance was an important tool.
It got me through 2019 that gotme to 2020 that healed a
majority of my sins from 19.
And you know, that was animportant piece.
And I still remember the processI went through and settling that
claim.
I, I had list after list of allthese records of, of what we
went through and you know, thenthe process of going and
crossing that back over to scaletickets that went to the
(17:17):
elevator.
I, I I'd been a loss adjuster.
I knew that was the policy.
So I, I just smiled and said,yes, yes ma'am we'll, we'll keep
it.
We'll get it.
We'll I know what you're goingthrough.
Don't sweat it.
I've been there.
And, and just the thought ofstreamlining that process not
only saves me amount of time,but the level of accuracy we
move to in these claims and youknow what, I don't buy insurance
(17:40):
cause I wanna use it.
I wanna buy it so that if I haveto use it, I can make it to the
next season.
And being able to get thatprocess done is,
Speaker 1 (17:48):
Is incredibly important.
Absolutely, absolutely.
That that makes a ton of sense.
And so one of the things thatJeremy was talking about was the
ability to get the data from thenon stationary scales.
And that's the big change thisyear in the loss adjustment
manual, uh, in, in the fact thatwe can now accept the data from
(18:09):
the non stationary scales or thegrain carts.
Marsha, can you talk to us alittle bit about why RMA made
some of these revisions andwhat's the thinking behind it?
Speaker 2 (18:20):
I will give that a try.
You know, when my husband and Istarted farming in 1982, we just
did not have the technology.
I mean, I think if you had, uh,an eight function calculator,
that was probably the extent ofit.
Um, it was before cell phones,that kind of thing.
And technology has reallysurpassed many, many things.
(18:43):
I mean, I think as a humanfactor, it's surpassed a lot of
things that we can, we can'thardly seem to keep up with.
And so things like nonstationary grain scales, um, it
only makes sense.
I mean it's accurate, that'sproven out time and time again,
when the information goes into agrain cart, sometimes it's just
(19:04):
haul to town.
Sometimes it's put in a bin fora short period of time and then
haul to town and when you get itto the elevator, it matches.
So why wouldn't we also acceptthat kind of record keeping and
the, the ease of it for thefarmer.
I can remember keeping track ona little notebook when I'm
sitting in the combine about howmany loads I filled and you
(19:26):
know, and then of course youlose track, which field were you
were even in.
Whereas that grain cart istracking that on a GPS type of
system where that wagon sat andhow much got dumped in there.
And it's all right there for theease of the farmer.
You know, I, I, I'm not familiarwith that specific type of
(19:46):
technology at my farm.
We're not quite there yet, but Ithink that's what RMA looked at.
There was a lot of datacollected through that system
and the accuracy of it was spoton.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
Excellent.
And so, uh, really appreciatethat perspective.
So Brad, how does this additionof being able to accept data
from non stationary skills?
How does that impact cropinsurance agents or insurance
adjusters?
And does it make anything easierfor them?
Speaker 4 (20:16):
Um, yeah, I mean it makes it a lot easier to be able
to report, um, informationcoming in.
And if I could, let me just kindof take one step back with crop
insurance, a farmer has toreport what they actually plant
to the U S D a for thesedifferent farm programs by C,
which is the common land unit.
So it's those field boundariesthat the FSA office says that
(20:39):
that field is kind ofstreamlining.
That process makes it, you know,with my data.
Um, it makes it a little biteasier to report that data
directly to the U S D a and thenbeing able to tie that grain
that's harvested off of thoseC's and tying it back just makes
the process that much easier.
And the reporting process to theS D a for the acreage report is
(21:01):
a very analog process, verysimilar to the production
reporting.
Also again, a very analogprocess agents and adjusters
alike.
They have to, uh, make sure thatthe production that they're
taking is accurate and they haveto, a lot of times track down
that information.
I mean, I've heard a lot oftimes where an agent would be
trying to get ahold of aproducer and, you know, let's
(21:23):
say the producer is off onvacation or, you know, once the
harvest is done, they just kindof vanish sometimes.
So a lot of times it's difficultfor the agent to be able to get
that information back, to finishthe reporting process, very
similar to an adjuster, anadjuster would go, and they
would have to take thatinformation, um, off tie it back
to the unit that it goes to.
(21:44):
A lot of times that productionis co-mingled across fields and
or diluting that production overfrom good fields over bad fields
, uh, that doesn't always help.
I mean, having an accurate, uh,production history, it is more
beneficial to the producer onthe adjuster side of things.
You know, the harvestedproduction talked about
(22:05):
settlement sheets.
I mean, that's usually what mostpeople use, but a lot of times
grain bins, right, an adjusterwould go and measure a grain bin
and have to determine how muchgrain is in that bin to settle a
claim.
Well, some of the problems withthat is, is you could have
issues with those calculations.
You could measure the conewrong, you could measure the
test weight, wrong moisture, forinstance.
(22:27):
So Marsha, you talked a littlebit about load logs, you know,
kind of in sitting in thetractor and writing those things
down, having thatcontemporaneous load log.
I mean, you nailed it, you, youmight miss a load.
You might miss where thatproduction's coming from from
that field.
So by having those grain cartswith that GPS sensor in it, you
(22:47):
know, like the GT five 60, forinstance, which has the GPS
tracker, it's got the, uh,moisture sensor right in there
as well, too.
So being able to track thatinformation and tie it directly
back to where that productionwas harvested from is gonna make
everybody's life easier.
The farmer, the adjuster, allthe way to the agent just makes
(23:10):
it that much easier.
So, um, it just way moreaccurate determination of that
yield, which is gonna make it,so the producer has a higher APH
as well, too.
So,
Speaker 1 (23:20):
And in that case, the APH would be their average
production history.
So the idea is, is that throughthe accuracy, they're always
getting the most accurateinformation and, and the best
information about theiroperation, right?
Brad,
Speaker 4 (23:34):
The approved production history.
So yeah, it would be thataverage over a period of time,
you know, you gotta have atleast five years of, of actual
production history.
And, um, just having thathistory there creates that, uh,
that guarantee, which is gonnagive that protection to the
farmer.
So again, just having it all tieback directly to where that
frame originated is just, itmakes it that much easier.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
Perfect.
Well, so it, it sure soundsgood, but Jeremy, I mean, you've
been living this world for along time, is it as good as it
all sounds
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Absolutely is, um, you know, the GT five 60 was a
huge step in the right directionof getting to where we're at
today and I've owned one ofthem, I don't know, since a long
time.
And, you know, and as wecontinue to move forward and,
and looking at, you know, thesmart cart and, and how we're
(24:25):
connecting a GT five 60 and, andtransferring data into tap to,
to go ahead and automate theseprocesses even more, the easy
button is more insight than it'sever been from, from a lot of
levels, whether it's from, youknow, completing this reporting
that we're talking about,whether I'm the case of a loss,
or just even in my APHreporting, you know, of, of
(24:47):
having that in a streamlinedprocess that creates one report.
I might finally become thefarmer that the adjuster doesn't
just scratch his head and say,all right, let's just figure
this out.
And that would be, that would bean exciting time
because I do my level best everytime.
You know, when, when we knowthere's a loss to make sure it's
all in one bin and, and notifythe adjuster and get the tape on
(25:11):
the bin and, or get him here tomeasure it.
But, you know, you
production.
And that used to be a word thatought to be struck from all of
our vocabularies, because thatwas the most evil word you could
hear, whether you were a lossadjuster was a farmer, is how
did you ever solve thatco-mingled production problem.
And in a lot of cases youdidn't, and when you couldn't
(25:34):
solve that problem, nine timesout of 10 led to there not being
a loss or not helping me get theassistance I needed to get
through that season from aproduct that I'd purchased to
get through that and, and how wecan streamline these processes
to eliminate that make the lifeeasier.
And, you know, some of thetechnologies that Topcon has
brought us through this, youknow, GT five 60 and, and the
(25:57):
smart cart is gonna even make itsimpler.
And it's really exciting, youknow, I assume my whole career
talking about, you know, ifyou're gonna work with farmers,
you need to meet'em wherethey're at on the technology
curve.
And it's really exciting to see,you know, RMA taking some steps
to begin to meet me where I'm aton the technology curve and
utilizing the technology.
I didn't buy it for cropinsurance reporting.
(26:19):
I bought it because there wasother value in my operation and
what I wanted to do with thatdata and how I was gonna make
money with that data.
It's incredibly exciting to knownow that that same technology is
gonna port over into the cropinsurance side, through RMA to
streamline those processes andmake it simple.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Perfect.
Now, Brad, do you wanna describefor us a little bit about how
Maya data and Topcon worktogether to create some of this
streamlining?
Speaker 4 (26:46):
Yeah, absolutely.
So with my, a data, you couldthink of us as the, uh, TurboTax
of acreage reporting.
So, you know, be able to takeplanted data, whether that be
from, uh, a planter, you know,precision ag, or whether that be
C L U, like I talked aboutearlier, just kind of making it
so you have the acreage reportand be able to push that to the
(27:06):
U S D a for the first step,creating that acreage report,
helping that process with ourpartnership, with Topcon, what
we can do with cloud basedreporting with a tap account, if
harvested information is in tapthrough those GT five 60 S
you'll easily be able to makethat cloud connection and then
bring those grain cart, loadlogs directly into Maya data by
(27:29):
that cloud connection.
So it's very easy process.
It's very automated when thatcloud connection is established.
And again, it's tying itdirectly back to that planted
shape, making it a lot easierfor that production report to be
generated, to be able to give tothe adjuster to the agent, to
whomever needs that productionreporting process.
(27:50):
So just a, a very, uh, simplecouple clicks bringing in that
cloud connection and that tyingit back to that planted shape.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Perfect.
Well, really appreciate thatexplanation.
Um, helps everybody understandhow the data layers are flowing
out of, out of, uh, Jeremy'sgrain card and then in, in,
through, um, into tap and thenin, through my, a data, and then
eventually being able to besubmitted, um, into, uh, uh, to
(28:19):
both crop insurance agents, uh,the AIPs, as well as to RMA,
right.
Uh, potentially in remittance ofthose claims.
Now, um, I, one of the thingsthat I see that we see on the
landscape is, uh, specificallyis just how responsive the RMA
has been.
And, and Marsha, we see that,um, you know, that you are
(28:41):
really driving change or, uh,change towards farmers in the
RMA.
And the fact that you're, you'retrying to do a adapt to things
like, like these kinds ofthings, being able to accept
data from non stationary scalesor even, uh, help to look at the
lo at the potential loss of, ofin season application of
(29:02):
nitrogen, some of those kinds ofthings.
Um, Marsha, is there anythingelse you want to tell us a
little bit about where you see,um, RMA headed and crop
insurance headed into 22 and 23,or what you really see on the
horizon is next for RMA and forcrop insurance?
Speaker 2 (29:18):
Certainly there's a number of initiatives that we've
been working on and that we haverecently announced, like I
referred to earlier, the organictransition, also the assistance
for organic producers that werefer to as Toga.
There's also been changes to thewhole farm revenue protection
(29:39):
policy.
We've increased the limits bydoubling it so that we are not
excluding, um, individuals basedupon size, but we've also done
on the other spectrum with microfarms for those small producers,
with the micro farm policy thathas been rolled out, um, in the
last year or so that we haveincreased that limit as well.
(30:01):
Because with the feedback fromstakeholders, from producers
that the initial cap at ahundred thousand dollars was
just not really reaching thetargeted audience.
So we've increased that limit to300, 350,000, um, somewhere in
there.
So those are some of thosechanges.
The other thing that we've madechanges to is the reporting for
(30:27):
vertically integrated types ofoperations.
We used to require third partyverification of production up
front.
We've moved that to the back end, which allows easier reporting
for those producers using wholefarm.
They're allowed to now use theirown records.
They don't need to have the AIPcome out and do a pre-harvest
(30:51):
type of appraisal.
We included a number of crops inthose changes, and we have those
listed out on our RMA website.
And I think it's just an everevolving process.
We love to hear feedback fromgrowers and their grower
organizations, because they'rethe ones that are where the
(31:12):
rubber meets the road astechnology changes as production
types of things change.
As we add more crops, that inputis valuable.
And along with the types oftechnology that we're talking
about today with ag data RMAlives and breathes by data, and
that's what continues to makecrop insurance so sound and what
(31:38):
the taxpayer wants to see thatthis is a very concentrated
effort to use science, tosubstantiate all of the policies
that we are implementing.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Fantastic, and really salute, um, the changes and, and
really the direction that you'reworking to push, uh, RMA, uh, in
being more grower responsive,and really aligning to the
workflow.
Really appreciate that.
And, uh, so Brad, from yourperspective, is there anything
else that our listers shouldknow?
Speaker 4 (32:13):
Uh, yeah, absolutely.
So, you know, one thing that Ijust kind of wanted to just to
circle back to one comment thatMarsha made is just making this
program viable, making sure thateverything is correct, you know,
fraud, waste and abuse getsthrown around a lot, right?
So the fraud waste and abusewithin crop insurance is a very
small amount compared that tolet's say, Medicare, Medicaid,
(32:35):
the fraud waste and abuse couldbe 20, 25%, even higher.
Some, some cases and the fraudwaste and abuse within crop
insurance is very small.
It's like under 2%.
And with these new advantages byusing data, for instance, like
Marsha had just talked about itis gonna make that even less.
I mean, just having accuratedetermination of yield from the
(32:57):
smart cards, precision ag dataand the planting, you know,
ensuring actual planting versusthe C L U I mean, all those
things are gonna ask help theprogram succeed long term.
So I think that was just onething I kind of wanted to point
out, uh, just kind of hearingthat comment.
The other thing is, is how cangrowers take advantage of these
changes?
So, one thing that I would checkis see if their indicator on
(33:21):
their grain card can supportsome of these things, talk with
their agents and their adjustersand how they can work together
to streamline this process.
See if their crop insurancecompanies will be able to accept
this data electronically.
That's a big thing.
Right?
Finally, I, I think I would justpush growers to check out crop
reporting.com, which is moreinformation about acres
(33:44):
reporting process and theproduction reporting process.
Um, talk kind of explains thepartnership that my ag data and
Topcon has and, and how you canbenefit by utilizing precision
ag data, um, and that reportingprocess so that I would direct
people that way to learn moreinformation.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
Perfect.
And so Brad, that was www dotcrop reporting, C R O P R E P O.
RT I N g.com.
Right.
Crop reporting.com.
Speaker 4 (34:15):
That's correct.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
Perfect, perfect, good stuff.
Really, really good stuff.
Jeremy, do you have any partingthoughts?
I mean, you've, you've, you'vebeen sitting on the sidelines
seeing a lot of this stuff asit's evolving, where do you see
this thing going?
I, I mean, are we, are wegetting traction?
Is it working?
Speaker 3 (34:35):
We're definitely getting traction.
And, and the first thing that Idon't wanna forget to save
before I end, so I'll say itnow.
So Marsha, thank you for yourrole in working to make my life
simpler because it's, it'sincredibly exciting to hear
that.
Like I said, once before, Idon't buy crop insurance because
I wanna use it, but the years Ido need to use it, I really need
(34:56):
to use it most likely.
And you know, my really onlyparting thought, you know, is
we've got growers or evenprecision ag practitioners,
agronomists, whoever may belistening to this is kind of
like Brad said, if, if you'renot doing it, ask the questions.
It would shock me that if a lotof the people, or maybe even
(35:17):
some of the growers, they maynot have the, the exact
indicator today to do what we'retalking about.
The scale head that's settingout there.
But in most cases, you know, ifyou've got a Digi star already,
you probably can add a five 60rather economically, and begin
that process of using thistechnology and make your life
simpler.
I mean, I can tell you, yes, Iknow I've got a day job too, but
(35:40):
it seems like I'm doing morebusy work on the farm than I
want to, which takes time awayfrom my family and doing the fun
things I wanna do.
And you know, all of thesethings that we've talked about,
the changes we've made, whetherit's on the front side of the
acreage reporting are the backside of the loss adjustment, you
know, side of this business, oreven APH reporting the tools and
(36:00):
technology are there to free upmore time to let me do the
things I wanna do.
That's fun, not the busy work.
And if you haven't looked atthat technology, take the 15
minutes outta your life and askthe question, uh, because I
think it'll, well, I don't thinkI know I've felt it firsthand.
It's freed up time for me that Ididn't have to spend doing
(36:21):
paperwork processing loadrecords and Marcia your comment
about writing them in a book.
We still have one driver thatwrites everything in a book, and
it's really entertaining to seehow sometimes how accurate they
are and sometimes how inaccurateyet they are.
You know, it, it's just excitingto see where technology went.
(36:42):
I'm just life part of,
Speaker 1 (36:54):
Well of I'd all three of you, um, as our guest today.
And that would be Jeremy Wilson,um, from Newton, Illinois, uh,
Brad Meyer from Maya data.
And most importantly, MarshaBunger the administrator of the
U S D A's RMA risk managementagency.
And, um, really appreciateeverybody in the time that
(37:16):
they've spent with us.
Thank you, dear listeners for,uh, the time that you've spent
tuning in.
If you've enjoyed this episode,remember to like share and
subscribe to Topcon talks,agriculture on Spotify, apple
podcast, Amazon music, orwherever you get your podcast.
Thank you very much.
(37:36):
And we look forward to here intri next episode,
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