In a typical year, the enrollment period for Agriculture Risk Coverage and Price Loss Coverage programs would be underway now, with a deadline of around mid-March. But 2026 is not a typical year.
Enrollment for these programs has not started, and the date to do so is not even set. USDA has cited heavy workloads at FSA offices as a contributing factor to this delay. Changes introduced in the One Big Beautiful Bill also may be slowing down the system. That includes higher reference prices for certain commodities under PLC, and an increase in ARC guarantees from 86% of benchmark revenue up to 90%.
If you’re frustrated by the uncertainties caused by these delays, it may help to know a huge silver lining is in play, according to Carl Zulauf, professor emeritus with the Ohio State University.
“Growers are not being disadvantaged,” he said. “The deferral of the decision timeline will work to their advantage. They will know more information.”
For example, if enrollment stretches into April or May, you will know what you were able to plant, Zulauf said.
“As you gain more information, you should be able to make a closer approximation to the program that will pay the most,” he said. “That’s what most farmers are interested in, for obvious reasons!”
That doesn’t mean an absence of uncertainty, Zulauf adds. Markets can still react strangely, and supply and demand trends are often volatile.
“Sometimes you think you’re making the most profitable decision, and it doesn’t turn out that way,” he said. “But every day this is delayed is the potential you will have to learn something important.”
Zulauf said this is especially true for winter wheat and other fall-planted crops. Farmers may well know what their yields are, depending on when the enrollment period is.
Refresher on ARC/PLC
Let’s start with ARC, which provides revenue-based protection. Payments are triggered when actual revenue for a crop falls below guaranteed levels. ARC tends to make sense for farmers who face significant yield variability. It also tends to be more beneficial when commodity prices are relatively stable or high.
Now on to PLC. It’s price-based protection that triggers payments when the market price for a crop falls below a reference price that is set by the farm bill. Payments are determined by the difference between the effective price and the reference price. Lower commodity prices tend to make PLC more lucrative in many cases.
A summary of key differences between ARC and PLC include:
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It’s interesting to note that from 2014-18 (when these programs were first introduced), 93% of corn base acres and 97% of soybean base acres were enrolled in ARC. Given the downturn in commodity prices, PLC became far more popular in recent years.
“I would encourage any farmer to go to meetings and learn about them,” Zulauf said. “The recent changes [in these programs] are big enough that it’s definitely worth it to revisit and know what the prices are and the mechanisms of the programs.”