Insurance Archives

Farm building code updates will drive insurance increases

Added costs such as fire separation areas and bracing affect replacement value

By Stew Slater March 9, 2025

Glacier FarmMedia — An unintended consequence of planned upgrades to Canada’s National Farm Building Code (NFBC) may be higher farm insurance rates. That’s because, regardless of how the insured structure is built, if destroyed it will have to be rebuilt to the new and more complex code. An Ontario member of the Canadian Farm Building […] Read more

Crops, Weather, Wheat & Chaff

U.S. hail insurer looks northward

By Dave Bedard March 3, 2025

Farmers Mutual Hail Insurance Co. of Iowa has made its first venture outside the U.S., buying the 80 per cent of Prairie crop hail insurance firm Palliser Insurance it didn’t already own, for an undisclosed amount. FMH CEO Shannon Rutledge said in a release in February that Palliser’s “regional expertise, knowledge and accomplishments…will contribute to […] Read more

Columns, Farm Life

Great questions to uncover inheritance expectations

Seeds of Encouragement: Keeping a farm intact can complicate the process, but not insurmountably so

By Elaine Froese June 22, 2024

One of the key fears of aging farm founders is the conflict they anticipate when the farming heir has access to millions of dollars of land, and the siblings who are off to other careers do not have the same net worth opportunity in their future. Or do they? Firstly, where it is written that […] Read more

Drought has meant more demand for forage insurance, but accuracy of measurement based on local conditions is challenging.

Cattleman’s Corner, Forages, Weather

Satellite-based insurance may be future of forage risk management

Analysis from above could be an accurate, timely way to measure forage growth

By Melissa Jeffers-Bezan March 4, 2024

Glacier FarmMedia — Satellite-based insurance technology could be a way to protect beef producers during times of drought. There’s more interest in forage insurance during recent droughty times on the Prairies, but evaluating local forage risk is challenging. “Weather events are becoming more acute in severity and frequency, you know the drought of 2023, 2021,” […] Read more

File photo of sunset over port facilities at Odesa. (Mixarde/iStock/Getty Images)

General, Markets, Reuters

Ukraine announces ‘humanitarian corridor’ for other stuck ships

Moscow not yet commenting on plan

By GFM Network News August 11, 2023

Kyiv | Reuters — Ukraine announced a “humanitarian corridor” in the Black Sea on Thursday to release cargo ships trapped in its ports since the outbreak of war, a new test of Russia’s de facto blockade since Moscow abandoned a deal last month to let Kyiv export grain. At least initially, the corridor would apply […] Read more

Liberia-flagged bulker K Sukret, carrying grain under the Black Sea Grain Initiative, waits for inspection in the southern anchorage of Istanbul on May 17, 2023. (Photo: Reuters/Mehmet Emin Caliskan)

Crops, Markets, Reuters

Insurers seen reviewing Black Sea ship cover after Russia quits deal

Last ship covered under deal left Sunday

By GFM Network News July 17, 2023

London | Reuters — Insurers are reviewing whether to freeze cover for any ships willing to sail to Ukraine after Russia on Monday quit a UN-backed deal that allows the export of grain through a wartime Black Sea safe corridor, industry sources said. The agreement, brokered by Turkey last July, aimed to alleviate a global […] Read more

Commercial vessels –including vessels which are part of the Black Sea grain deal — wait to pass the Bosphorus strait off the shores of Yenikapi during a misty morning in Istanbul, Turkey on Oct. 31, 2022. (Photo: Reuters/Umit Bektas)

Crops, Reuters

Insurers covering Ukraine grain corridor shipments for now

More clarity needed soon, Lloyd's exec says

By GFM Network News March 24, 2023

London | Reuters — Insurers continue to cover grain shipments from Ukraine through a United Nations-backed corridor although more clarity will be required soon, a senior Lloyd’s of London official said on Thursday, after the export accord was renewed for at least 60 days. The deal allowing the safe wartime export of Ukrainian grain from […] Read more

A composite satellite view of Hurricane Fiona nearing Nova Scotia at about 6 p.m. local time on Sept. 23, 2022. (U.S. National Hurricane Center image, NOAA.gov)

General, Machinery, Weather

Nova Scotia to bridge Fiona funding gap for farmers

Provincial program offering up to $400K per farm

By Dave Bedard, GFM Network News February 25, 2023

Nova Scotia farmers who didn’t qualify for federal disaster financial assistance (DFA) in the wake of Hurricane Fiona last September may be able to get in on a new provincial program instead. The province on Thursday announced $3 million for what it calls the Fiona Agriculture Response Gap Funding program, offering up to $400,000 for […] Read more

Kristjan Hebert says rather than focusing on how much they’re willing to spend on ag insurance premiums, farmers would be better off considering how much money they’re prepared to lose.

Wheat & Chaff

Halsall: Aim for the home run ball

By Mark Halsall December 30, 2022

Every year, farmers play a high-stakes game against Mother Nature and all of the other in-season perils, betting their fields will yield a bounty of profitable crops come harvest. It’s risky, of course, which is why crop insurance is such a vital aspect of risk management for many western Canadian producers. But is crop insurance […] Read more

File photo of barley being loaded for export at the Black Sea port of Mykolaiv, Ukraine on July 9, 2013. (Photo: Reuters/Vincent Mundy)

Crops, Reuters

Ship insurers to cancel war cover for Russia, Ukraine from Jan. 1

By GFM Network News December 29, 2022

London | Reuters — Ship insurers said they are cancelling war risk cover across Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, following an exit from the region by reinsurers in the face of steep losses. Reinsurers, who insure the insurers, typically renew their 12-month contracts with insurance clients on Jan. 1, giving them the first opportunity to scale […] Read more

Alberta crop conditions improve: report

U.S. grains: Corn sets contract lows on expectations for big US crop

U.S. livestock: Cattle strength continues

GFM Network News