Farm safety net elections now open for 2026 crop year

A free online tool from the Texas A&M Agricultural and Food Policy Center in the Department of Agricultural Economics can help farmers decide which coverage will work best for them.

The Agricultural and Food Policy Center, which operates jointly with Texas A&M AgriLife Research, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service and Texas A&M University, conducts policy research and analysis for the agricultural sector, including annual farm bill decision aids used by producers and lenders nationwide.

Later start offers time for better planning

Ready to run the numbers?

Don’t wait until the deadline. The Agricultural and Food Policy Center’s decision aids can help you make an informed choice based on your operation.

ACCESS THE FREE TOOLS

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, USDA, opened the election and enrollment period Sept. 16, later than usual, said Bart Fischer, Ph.D., Agricultural and Food Policy Center co-director. The delay stemmed from the time needed to implement the Working Families Tax Cuts Act, which added an estimated 30 million base acres nationwide.

In 2025, the U.S. Congress simply gave producers the higher of ARC or PLC rates — no decision required — and those payments start arriving in producers’ bank accounts in October.

This year, growers must choose between the two programs, with the decision coming later in the year than usual. The Agricultural and Food Policy Center built the free online tool to help them use their yield information to make that decision.

Signup for the 2027 crop year will run Nov. 2 through March 15.

Fischer said the later start benefits producers.

“Growers will have much more knowledge about the 2026 crop year when making the decision between ARC and PLC because some crops like wheat have already been harvested while the spring-planted crops either have been or soon will be harvested,” he said.  “They can use the information relevant to their operations and our tool to help decide between the programs.”

Weigh risk with free online decision tool

Although producers may have a good sense of actual 2026 county yields, one uncertainty remains: crop prices. Both programs base payments on marketing year average prices calculated over the 12 months following harvest, meaning the price side of the equation is still an estimate.

To help producers sort through the decision, the center has updated its free online decision aid to reflect the new provisions under the Working Families Tax Cuts Act. The tool compares expected payments under PLC and ARC-County, ARC-CO, using a farm’s base acres, PLC yields and irrigation percentages.

Producers can plug in USDA’s forecasted prices or enter their own estimates, and the tool returns expected payments, including statistics and probability charts for each option.

What producers need to get started

The Agricultural and Food Policy Center also offers a separate Excel-based tool for producers weighing ARC-Individual, ARC-IC, which consolidates a producer’s FSA farms and calculates benchmark revenue and potential payment rates.

Producers should have their base acre and program yield figures — found on the FSA-156EZ form from their local USDA-Farm Service Agency office — on hand before using either tool.

Both decision aids are available at afpc.tamu.edu/tools. Producers with questions can reach Agricultural and Food Policy Center staff at 979-845-5913 or 1-888-890-5663.

“We’ve been building these decision aids since the 2002 Farm Bill, and producers from all over the country rely on them every year,” said Joe Outlaw, Ph.D., Agricultural and Food Policy Center co-director. “This is our newest and most user-friendly version yet, and, if anyone runs into trouble working through it, our office is glad to help.”