Saskatchewan farmers will get an extra couple of weeks to apply for, cancel, reinstate or change their crop insurance contracts for 2022, due to holdups in the delivery of their application packages.
That deadline, originally March 31, has now been extended to April 14, provincial Ag Minister David Marit and his federal counterpart Marie-Claude Bibeau announced Monday.
The extension comes from a delay in delivery of crop insurance packages to farmers’ addresses, due to “logistical challenges because of the ongoing supply-chain issues posed by the pandemic.”
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The unspecified challenges came about after the packages left the offices of Melville-based Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corp. (SCIC) on Feb. 25, the province said.
As of last Thursday (March 10), the packages have been circulated and distributed to producers’ addresses, so farmers can expect to see those packages in their mailboxes “within the next few days,” the province said.
Producers must select insured crops and coverage levels or make additional changes by April 14 or their coverage will remain the same as the previous year, the province said.
Extensions to the usual end-of-March deadline aren’t new for SCIC. It granted a similar two-week extension in 2020 citing “evolving situations” including the COVID-19 pandemic, in which Saskatchewan’s first case was confirmed March 12 that year. — Glacier FarmMedia Network
