October 7, 2015 - Nacogdoches-Angelina-Trinity-San Augustine-Shelby County USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) Executive Director, Lance Jacobs urges producers who want to purchase coverage through the Noninsurable Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP) to please contact the office. The final date to report 2016 native and improved grasses intended for grazing or haying must be reported by November 15, 2015. This is two weeks earlier than the sales closing date of December 1, 2015 to purchase the coverage.
NAP provides financial assistance to producers of noninsurable crops when low yields/grazing loss, loss of inventory or prevented planting occur due to normal disasters.
The following crops have a NAP application closing date of Dec. 1, 2015: grazing and forage/hay on native and improved grass(this includes grasses for grazing and hay meadows such as Bahia, Coastal, Common Bermuda, and Hybrid Bermuda), honey, potatoes, radishes, grapes and caneberries.
In order to meet eligibility requirements for NAP, crops must be noninsurable, commercially-produced agricultural commodity crops for which the catastrophic risk protection level of crop insurance is not available.
In the event of a natural disaster, NAP covers the amount of loss greater than 50 percent of the expected production based on the approved yield and reported acreage.
Eligible producers can apply for coverage using form CCC-471, "Application for Coverage." Producers must file the application and service fee by the Dec. 1st deadline. The service fee is the lesser of $250 per crop or $750 per producer per administrative county, not to exceed a total of $1,875 for a producer with farming interests in multiple counties.
More information on NAP is available from the Nacogdoches-Angelina-Trinity-San Augustine-Shelby County FSA office at (936) 564-5891 Ext 2 or on FSA’s website at www.fsa.usda.gov/nap
