URBANA, Ill. — With crucial farm bill deadlines rapidly approaching, the University of Illinois Department of Agricultural and Consumer Sciences (ACES) offered a series of webinars last week designed to equip farmers with knowledge to make the best program decisions for their operations.

In addition, a trio of ag economists with ACES informed producers about a number of farm bill decision tools available through the university’s farmdoc website, and touted a series of live farm bill decision meetings being held across Illinois.

Illinois Corn sponsored the webinars, which took place Jan. 28-29, attracting more than 400 farmers seeking guidance on three decisions they face associated with the 2014 farm bill. The decisions are whether to keep or update yields, retain or reallocate base acres and which program to elect to receive commodity program payments.

Commodity program choices include Agricultural Risk Coverage at the county level (ARC-CO), Price Loss Coverage (PLC) and ARC at the individual farm level (ARC-IC). General advice came from U of I professors Gary Schnitkey, Jonathan Coppess and Nick Paulson, accompanied by an interactive online format featuring an Illinois “expected payments” map that allowed farmers to “test drive” program options before choosing.

The expected payment scenarios were created using the U of I’s new Agricultural Policy Analysis System. “APAS is a Web-based tool that will give you a look at how these programs are expected to pay out over time,” said Schnitkey, noting the APAS is available for farmers’ free use at www.farmdoc.illinois.edu

“Here are the three decisions that you need to make for each FSA (Farm Service Agency) farm,” Schnitkey continued. “Program yields; you will be given a choice to keep your current yield average or update it. The updated yield will be the average of 2008 through 2012 yields, with some ‘plug’ yields.

“The standard advice would be to choose the highest (yields). If that is the updated yields, provide the yields to FSA and update. If the current yield is highest, keep the current yield. This can be done on a crop-by-crop basis.

“Second decision: Base acres. You will be given two alternatives: retain the current base acre allocation in the crops or reallocate them. It’s important to note that both of these decisions will have the same number of total base acres, just varied by which crops are in what acreage,” he said.

Coppess said the “real fun” lies in the third decision farmers face: Which commodity program under which to operate their FSA farm or farms. Price expectations over the next five years will impact commodity program choice, he explained. ARC-CO will likely have higher payments than PLC when corn prices are above $3.30 a bushel, while ARC-CO will maximize soybean payments when soybean prices eclipse the $8 plateau. ARC-CO will maximize wheat payments when five-year average prices exceed $5.50, he said. Illinois maps detailing expected payments for 2014 were used during this segment of the webinar and are available to producers on the farmdoc website.

In addition, “SCO is a supplemental coverage option that is available beginning in 2015; however, it cannot be mixed with either of the ARC programs,” said Coppess. “The key is the deadlines. The program yields and base acres decisions deadline is February 27. The program election deadline is March 31. These deadlines are approaching quickly.”

Yield update and base acre reallocation decisions are made by landowners, unless farmers who rent land have a signed power of attorney document authorizing the decisions.

As for the commodity program choice, Coppess noted farmers who fail to declare a program choice before the deadline will automatically be assigned to PLC and will forfeit any possible 2014 payments. All decisions are non-revocable and will be in force throughout the five-year life of the farm bill.

Schnitkey offered final advice for farmers considering their commodity program choices: “We would suggest using the allocation with the most corn and the least number of soybean acres. We expect corn to make higher payments than soybeans over the next several years.”

The economists advised farmers with any further questions regarding farm bill decisions to email their queries directly to FarmDoc@illinois.edu

The free webinars have been recorded and posted to the farmdoc website, for those who missed the webinar series. In addition, Illinois Corn will provide DVDs of the webinars to farmers who request them. Also available on the farmdoc website is the U of I’s Farm Bill 2014 Calculator.

Rounding out the roster of farm bill decision tools offered by the U of I, ACES experts will continue to host an ambitious series of live meetings around the state to help guide farmers in farm bill decisions. Remaining live seminar dates and locations include Feb. 5 in Kankakee and Oglesby; Feb. 6 in Macomb and Springfield; Feb. 11 in Champaign and Bloomington; Feb. 12 in Effingham and Mt. Vernon; and Feb. 13 in Carterville and Collinsville. For more details and to register, contact the College of ACES or visit the farmdoc website.