He hates saying that, but Ernest Fulford wants a hurricane.
The storm tore 1,600 acres of Jefferson County growers last fall, flooding thousands of pounds of fresh peanuts, and dropping fluffy white cotton bolls into the mud, weeks away from harvest.
Crop insurance payments maintained his Florida farm, family legacy since the 1940s, and business.
The federal crop insurance program has escaped the Trump administration’s drastic cuts so far, costing the government an average of $9 billion a year. Climate change could potentially be raised by a third by 2080, according to the US Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service. Despite rising investment, the program is struggling to hit smallholder farmers and people, including Fulford, in a series of storms.
It worries Anne Shetchinger, an agricultural economist at the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit that supports crop insurance reform.
“The crop insurance program is not really helping farmers adapt to extreme weather from climate change,” she said, relying on past crops and weather data rather than future-looking climate models.
“The last 20 years, specifically historic yields, not the next 20 years for these farmers.”
The origin of the program
Crop insurance, born from the urgency of the Dust Bowl era to support farmers in times of disaster, is operated through a partnership between the USDA risk management agency and private insurance companies.
Growers purchase policies from private companies and take about 40% of their costs to the forefront. The federal government contributes to the other 60%, covering some of the insurance companies’ operating expenses.
The Congressional Budget Office and the Government Accountability Office have recommended lower premium subsidies in the program and curbing management funds, citing above-average profits for private companies, but Congress has not taken such measures.
The cost of the program to the federal government increased between 2014 and 2023, totaling $89 billion.
The federal government implemented hurricane-specific policy add-ons in 2020 in response to pressure from stormy farmers in the southeast, and expanded the program to tropical storms in 2023.
Last year, climate-friendly measures were added to the list of programs for accepted agricultural practices. “It was a really big change,” Shetchinger said, but it didn’t fix it all.
The dilemma of a small farmer
The number of insured acres almost doubled between 2014 and 2024, but the number of policies was less than 1%.
Nationally and locally, the large farms have grown, and the smaller ones have disappeared.
“What we see in our area of Florida is that farmers grow or farmers go out of business,” said Lance Braswell, insurance agent at the Big Bend Farm Bureau. “So, the number of farmers is declining, but the farmers we have are expanding their production levels.”
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Smallholder farmers are disproportionately affected by climate change. They have fewer reserves to retreat and are more likely to grow in disaster-prone areas.
They most need the resilience provided by crop insurance, but are less likely to get coverage than large farmers. About three-quarters of farms over 500 acres have crop insurance, but there are less than 10 acres and less than 10% of farms.
“If you have more acres, you’ll receive a bigger payment,” Shechinger said. “It’s really built into the program to benefit these large, often wealthy farms.”
According to a report by the Government Accountability Bureau, in 2022, 1% of farmers with the most expensive crop insurance received about a fifth of the government’s subsidies. The single nursery received a $7.7 million subsidy, while most policyholders averaged $3,200.
A lower subsidies means higher out-of-pocket costs for farmers. This could block the grower.
“If you can’t get a policy or you can’t afford it, it doesn’t matter if you’re in a hurricane-style county,” Shetchinger said.
When historical yields face historic storms
Insurers will determine how much amount to cover farmers’ crops, depending on the grower’s production over the past few years.
In a non-hulicane year, Fulford is planning to harvest 1,200 pounds of cotton lint per acre. However, Hurricane Idria, Debbie and Helen destroyed his yields. Looking at his historic production, the current agency only guarantees Fulford.
If a grower filed a claim during a particularly bad season, most crop insurance will calculate that year’s yields. However, when the territory faces repeated catastrophes, record lows become new normals.
That’s why Fulford wants two extremes. If the growth period is perfect and harvests all 1,200 pounds, he can reconstruct the history of the harvest and make profits despite low market prices. When a hurricane comes, he will at least receive crop insurance payments.
But if conditions like drought or flooding are somewhere in the middle, for example, Fulford may lose half of his crop and not be compensated despite paying for the policy.
“Essentially, I’m not insured this year,” he said. “It’s hard to put all that money into your crop knowing you’re most likely to lose at the end of the year. It’s hard to continue that year.”
Hurricane shelter has become a hot spot
Braswell of Big Bend Insurance Agent thought he had chosen a quiet area to work for.
“We haven’t seen a big storm in the last 100 years,” he said. “We were in an area we thought would be susceptible to the effects.”
Most farmers in the area did not have crop insurance. Those who chose the lowest level known as catastrophic coverage to qualify for other USDA programs and benefits.
Fulford himself has been carrying only catastrophic reports for decades, and has been paid “never, never.”
Florida experienced hurricane droughts between 2006 and 2015, with storms saving sunshine. Hurricanes Helmin, Irma and Michael then hit Big Bend between 2016 and 2018.
“When Michael hit us,” Fulford said, “If I hadn’t bought that extra insurance, it would have left me out of business.”
The hurricane continued to hit the area. Idria arrived in 2023, followed by two punches in 2024, Hurricane Debbie and Helen.
“If there are three hurricanes in two years, (farmers) start to realize we are not immune,” Braswell said. “We need to make sure we pay an additional premium to protect against that risk.”
Hurricanes that hit Fulford’s farm last fall in West Florida can occur frequently every 2,100 years, on average, according to Princeton researchers.
Despite the rising frequency of double hurricanes, the insurance add-on allows you to pay one hurricane and one low tropical storm per season. When setting up premiums, we don’t use hurricane season predictions or predictions like the Princeton researchers.
“That’s not really fair,” Fulford said. “Especially for areas like us who are hit by hurricanes. The rest of the country hasn’t taken those yield hits.”
The battle to the farm
Even with last season’s hurricane payments and base crop insurance coverage, Fulford was at a loss for the year. He drives a “beated ’09 truck” and is waiting for a high-yield year to replenish his savings.
“I hope things get better financially for the farm now,” Fulford said. “This year, there are more farms out of business this year, due to lower product prices and higher input prices than I’ve seen in my life.”
Fulford can’t explain why he thrusts it out other than the fact that farming is in his blood.
“I hope you don’t love me that much,” he said. “I hope the kids don’t love that much.”
He tried to speak with his two sons from the industry and said, “Look, this is too hard to work, and sometimes there is no money.”
They don’t listen.
His eldest son Clay is a farm partner, and his 15-year-old is heading that route too.
Once his father has some equipment he thinks back to his wish for a hurricane. “A little bit,” he corrects. “It won’t destroy my crops.”
He laughs at the cacophony of ideas. “We have to do what we have to do to survive.”
This story was originally published by Wuft News and was shared in collaboration with the Martinez Room Initiative, founded by the Florida Climate Reporting Network, the Miami Herald, the South Florida Sun Sentinel, the Palm Beach Post, the Orlando Sentinel, WLRN Public Media, and the Tampa Bay Times.
