Though Hurricane Florence is long-gone, the Carolinas will be feeling the effects for a long time to come. Not only did the storm kill 45, but the sometimes-record flooding from the slow-moving storm hurt crops too.
"For farmers, Florence could not have come at a worse time; crops were maturing, and harvest had only begun. Depending on their production patterns, many farmers have seen several years of financial losses due to low crop prices. This leaves farmers, many of whom have not fully recovered from Hurricane Matthew two years ago, in a weakened financial condition before the hurricane hit," Harwood D. Schaffer and Daryll E. Ray write for their Agricultural Policy Analysis Center column.
Early estimates of agriculture losses range from hundreds of millions to billions of dollars. North Carolina grows 50 percent of the nation's tobacco, is the second-biggest pork production state, and the largest source of sweet potatoes in the nation. The state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services estimates that 3.4 million chickens and 5,500 hogs died in the floods; those farmers will not only be deprived of the profits from those animals, but will have to pay to dispose of them as the floodwaters recede. They will also need to clean up hog manure if it overflowed from the lagoons. Other affected crops in the Carolinas include cotton, peanuts, corn, and soybeans.
In addition to the damage to crops and livestock, many farms and roads sustained structural damage that will take a lot of time and money to fix, Schaffer and Ray write. And finally, the toxic ash pools from coal-fired power plants flooded in some areas, which could have dumped hazardous waste into surrounding areas.
Most farmers have crop insurance, but the payouts are based on crop prices. "The problem is the reimbursement that farmers receive is based on crop prices and when prices are low, and farmers need the protection the most, they receive the lowest insurance payments," Schaffer and Ray write. "If Congress were to adopt a supply management program with loan rates near the full cost of production, and if the price component of crop insurance were based on the loan rate, farmers would be better protected that they are under current policies.
Schaffer and Ray also recommend revisiting containment regulations for hog waste and fly ash to better cope with increasingly extreme weather.
from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/2DSjVhy Hazards to Carolinians persist after Hurricane Florence - Entrepreneur Generations
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