Content
2026 ARC/PLC Enrollment Deadlines
As harvest winds down, Nebraska producers need to make decisions about enrolling in the 2026 Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) programs. Nebraska Extension Ag Policy Specialist Brad Lubben discusses the updated enrollment deadline and key factors producers should consider when choosing their coverage options.
View Transcript
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
Agricultural producers have a relatively short window to complete their ARC PLC decisions for the 2026 crop year as the December 11th deadline approaches.
The sign up differs this year because it comes after harvest, when producers know what their yield is as opposed to making the decision in the spring before planting.
Extension ag policy specialist Brad Lubin, talks about a number of issues.
Producers need to consider, before signing up on today's almanac, the election is the decision between arc and PLC.
That ended up not mattering for 2025, but for 2026, producers, again, need to make an election between whether they will enroll in the arc program or the PLC program.
If they don't make an election, it does not revert to what they previously had done.
It is nothing, and they would end up qualifying for no support.
They need to make an election and they need to officially enroll in the program by the December 11th deadline.
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Brad says the shift on the normal spring sign up to fall could help producers make better decisions.
2026.
[Brad Lubben, Nebraska Extension Ag Policy Specialist]
We have a great deal more foresight of what we think will actually be the result.
Typically, we're doing this in the spring.
We're making decisions about a farm program safety net and a choice between the price-based PLC program and the revenue-based arc program.
But we're making that decision early in the spring when we don't have a great deal of inside on what the crop production year will look like.
We have early season price forecast, but that's a long ways away from the marketing you're even starting.
So it's more based on typical trends or expectations.
Uh, I should say with the caveat, wheat producers sign up in the spring for a crop that was planted back in the fall, they always have some insight about what the wheat crop might end up looking like.
But, uh, um, but generally speaking, we have to make decisions, uh, with with average or or sort of trend expectations, no real insight.
Now we're making decisions on the 2026 program year. At the time of fall harvest, where we at least know or have a very good idea of what our own yields look like.
And we have some idea of what we think county yields ended up being, although we don't have a final number and we don't know that number for several months yet.
And we have some projection, at least, of how the marketing year started with prices, but we don't have a final number either.
So we know more, or at least we think we know more than we would have back last spring, that gives us some insight in terms of the likelihood that either the arc program or the PLC program, or if your farm results are challenging, maybe arc icy specifically, might be a much stronger safety net for you going forward.
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Brad talks about issues producers face while waiting until the last minute to sign up.
[Brad Lubben, Nebraska Extension Gag Policy Specialist]
You know, that I think the best answer is they need to get into the office and make that decision and enroll when they can.
Uh, the waiting until December 11th.
Sounds like we're going to have more information.
We're not going to have substantially new information on either county yield or marketing your national marketing, your average price forecast.
So what we know today is a pretty strong indicator of where we think we are, at least for the fall.
Theoretically, you could wait until the last day, but not everybody can wait until the last day and still expect to get into the office.
So the better strategy, uh, make a decision, get it done, get enrolled.
If there's a reason to revisit the program, there may be an opportunity to revisit that election, but don't delay here.
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Stay tuned to feature programs where Brad talks about these issues in more detail.
Today's program was a portion of an interview taken from a recent Farmcast podcast offered by UNL Center for Ag Profitability to read the detailed article or listen to the entire interview, go to cap.unl.edu or download from Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
For Nebraska Extension Almanac.
I'm Brad Mills.
Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR media and Nebraska Extension.
For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
2026 Corn Harvest Issues
After weeks of wet weather, Nebraska corn growers are facing Grain Quality Concerns at Harvest. Nebraska Extension Educator Amy Timmerman talks about a few tips to manage some of the challenges growers have faced this harvest season.
View Transcript
[Mike Straub, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
With wet weather already complicating Nebraska's harvest, lodged corn can add another challenge for growers, caused by disease, drought, wind, or severe weather, down stocks can slow harvest, increase grain loss, and place additional demands on operators and equipment.
Extension educator, Amy Timmerman explains how adjusting harvesting practices, and combine settings can help growers recover more of their crop.
[Amy Timmermimmerman, Nebraska Extension Educator]
So, we know with logic corn, we want to harvest it as soon as possible because it's going to continue to go down.
And as we go down, then we're reducing our yields as a whole, and that's an economic hit to us, but then we're going to look at the other complications that come with large corn.
We're going to have all those ears in that field.
And so then we're looking at lots of volunteer corn potential for next year, and that can be a challenge in itself, depending on what your rotation is, um, what herbicide programs you're doing, different components like that.
Or you can look at it at the flip side, I'm going to bring cattle in there and I'm going to graze it.
I need to make sure I have my carrying capacity on my cattle at the same level of the amount of greenness out there.
So I don't run into secondary impacts of bloat and different components that can cost a major animal health issues in the long run.
And so we got to find that happy balance.
We want to pick it up as best as we can.
Now how we set that combine, even though we have to go slower, changes a little bit.
So we're gonna look at, depending on how it's down, what is the angle of our head.
So if it's down against the row, so our rows are going north and south and it's falling down east and west, we're going to put that head more straight.
As low as we can go so we can pick it up.
Now, if the corn is down with the row, we're gonna try to go against the tip, but we're actually gonna increase that angle, so our snouts are down lower, and then we're able to pick it up, we'll feed right into the combine.
We may have to make adjustments on how wide things are to allow more plant material in because of the way it's laying.
That's going to change how the combine's going to thrash that at the end, which means we may have to adjust fan speeds associated with it so we can blow out that low quality seed, our grain, but also get the material through.
And so the grain isn't dirty.
And I know that's one of the biggest fears everybody has.
They don't want dirty grain and I get it.
So we have to just rotor speeds and fan speeds.
We may also have to look at our chains.
Making the change in our in our sprockets and our chain placements, so it grabs the corn harder, those stocks that could be a little flimsy because we may have stock rots in there, and bringing it into that feeder head to assure that it's going to go through and it's going to thrash.
At the same time, going at a speed that's allowing that ear that might be hanging a little down like this, is actually feeding into the feeder head.
Versus, I'm taking the stock in, but I knock the ear off.
So whatever you're doing, the other big thing when we're looking at large corn is going out, looking at your harvest loss assessments.
So how many ears are actually getting dropped off by accident.
Or the other component is, as we're thrashing it through, maybe fan speed or rotor speed, we're not shattering it, and we're getting a lot of corn coming out the back end with the trash where we don't want it.
So once again, we're losing that yield.
But we have to stop and look at it and make those adjustments.
So my one last thing I will comment on, as we looked at lodge corn, if you had a major issue with lodging this year.
Make sure you take the time to make those notes in your field records, really recommend you to talk to your craft consultant, reach out, to extension.
And let's figure out why did we have that issue?
Um, was it a crown route?
Was it a stock route?
Was it just bad luck with weather that came and blew your corn down?
If it's a crown rot or stock rot, what are options we can do in the 27 growing season, maybe it might be a change in looking at disease ratings, on our corn varieties that we're selecting, um, maybe it's looking at different management forfolio diseases that we might be seeing in corn.
There's a lot of parameters, but definitely take those notes.
Definitely reach out this winter to your experts to figure out, what are ways to help mitigate that for next year?
[Mike Straub, Program Host]
For Nebraska Extension Almanac?
I Mike Straub.
Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR media and Nebraska Extension.
For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
The History of ARC/PLC payments
Agriculture Risk Coverage and Price Loss Coverage programs provide an important safety net for farmers. As payments arrive for the 2025 crop, Nebraska Extension Ag Policy Specialist Brad Lubben discusses lessons learned about program timing, risk management, and how well these programs align with producers’ needs.
View Transcript
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
On today's almanac, extension ag policy specialist Brad Lubin talks about the projected 2025 payments that are coming in now.
He says there's a bit of a discrepancy on how much will actually be paid.
[Brad Lubben, Nebraska Extension Ag Policy Specialist]
Well, it's worth looking back at 2025 as an indicator of how the program works and the variability that we end up seeing in the program as producers are thinking about 26 and then 27 enrollment decisions.
We did make a decision between Arc and PLC for 25 back in spring of 2025.
But then with the one Beautiful Bill Act, the budget reconciliation bill that was passed in the summer of 25 and made substantial changes of the program, increasing support levels for Arc and PLC, amongst other things.
The decision was written into that legislation to simply give producers the hire of arc or PLC for the 2025 crop year.
That's the payments that are arriving now in October of 2026.
Payments always come a year after harvest as the marketing year ends, and final payment rates are calculated and paid out.
But the cash flow that's coming now is that 2025 result, where producers originally made a decision, but ultimately, they got paid the hire of Barker PLC.
Well, theoretically, that sounds like an easy to calculate number, except don't forget, the PLC payment is unique to every farm, because there's a specific payment rate per bushel for each crop in the base, but it's also tied to your farm's program payment yield.
So it's unique to each farm in terms of the dollars per acre.
That's the dollar per acre payment rate that I calculate in the in the estimate there.
And if you look at average PLC payment yields by county across the state.
And then you calculate the payment rate accordingly, you can end up with corn PLC payment rates that range from roughly $26 to $48 an acre per paid acre.
That sounds like a substantial range, but it's exactly the same dollar per bushel payment rate.
It's just a function of average yields in the county.
Of course, on the farm. Even more unique.
So producers need to think about what their actual PLC payment would be on the farm.
Don't forget, that's per paid acre.
We only get paid on 85% of our base acres, so multiply that number by 85%.
Reduce it again by 5.7% for budget sequestration.
These payments, farm program payments are still subject to budget sequestration rules that were written more than a decade ago.
So the total payment ends up smaller.
But we have this comparison payment rate.
Well, the producers are going to get paid, the higher of arc or PLC.
Well, what's the arc payment?
It's a payment rate calculated at the county level, so everybody gets the same payment rate.
And if I looked at for corn again, for example, the arc payment rate, ranges from 0 to as much as 148 bucks an acre, 104, actually 147, 39.
Arc is payment racer dependent upon actual county yield results multiplied by that same national price compared to the guarantee.
So the payment rate will differ across counties, based on county results.
The payment rate differs also by irrigated versus non-irrigated practice, and for any one individual producer, their arc payment is a weighted combination of both irrigated and non-irrigated guarantees and results.
So even there, the actual payment rate for arc, as calculated, is very dependent on the farm level, um, sign up.
Then you compare the hire of arc or PLC and finally make a payment.
So trying to tell a producer exactly what the payment would be is really complicated.
It's dependent upon some very farm level, specific detail, and then trying to aggregate that and estimate what total payments in the state might look like is also, by nature, very complicated.
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Today's program was a portion of an interview taken from a recent Farmcast podcast offered by UNL Center for Ag Profitability.
To read the detailed article or listen to the entire interview, go to CAP.UNL.edu or download from Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
For Nebraska Extension Almanac.
I'm Brad Mills.
Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR Media and Nebraska Extension.
For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
Nebraska Digital Ag Hub
The Nebraska Digital Ag Hub is a new initiative from UNL aimed at helping producers make better use of digital agriculture technologies, from developing new decision-support tools to improving existing technologies and training the next generation of innovators. UNL Digital Ag Hub Interim Director Guillermo Balboa talks about the research that these tools are creating to keep Nebraska at the front of ag production.
View Transcript
[Mike Straub, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
Nebraska researchers have developed a wide array of digital tools that aid producers in managing nutrient application, improving animal welfare, mitigating spray drift, conserving water, and much more.
These tools are tested on Nebraska's research sites across the state or through Nebraska on farm research network.
Interim, digital AgHub director Guillermo Balboa speaks on the importance of this research.
[Guillermo Balboa, UNL Interim Digital AgHub Director]
So yeah, we just recently launched the dealery culture have at the University of Nebraska.
The goal of these hobbies to bring together university capacities in resource, teaching, and extension, and partnering with growers and ranchers across the state, and industry that we basically around challenges that we have in terms of digital agriculture, adoption.
One of the main challenges that we identify in one of the surveys that we run across the state is that growers really don't know for some of the tools, what is the real value, how many dollars per acre, they can improve if they implement it, or what is the real problem they are trying to tackle.
So one of the objectives of the hobbies to test these tools and to really show what is the real value of them.
And then giving the chance to the grower to say, yeah, this is something that can be used in my operations or not?
But also, the habit is meant to help to co develop those.
So we are trying to get growers and ranchers involve early in the stage of tools that are being developed here or could be developed for industry.
So they have a, the developer has an insight directly from the end user, and then the development process is more efficient at the end.
Nebraska growers, I would say, early adopters of a lot of these practices, and you can tell that, but the involvement that they have in different programs from the university, like the Nebraska confound research network.
They're always asking questions about, hey, is this work?
I have this problem, I can use this tool.
Um, so the, the, the, Nebraska is very culture, have the idea is to bring together and and to help to catalyze those processes are already happening, to take them to the next level, right?
To have more growers involved, to have more ranchers involved, to have more industries collaborating with university, in the development of those tools.
So, in some cases, we will be involved only in the testing of that tool, and then the idea is to try to scale the use of those tools.
Not forgetting that we also need to train the next generation of people that needs to use these tools, right?
The workforce was identified as one of the limitations for implementation of these practices, right?
We need people that is trained on how to use these tools along with the growers and farmers.
We recently launched how we are working hard on different aspects to start rolling in the ball.
One of them is having some conversations with some particular industries to start working on our agreements to test some of these practices.
We're also revising all, uh, some of the students, curriculum for undergrad and graduate programs to make sure that we're incorporating all that content related to digital culture.
And we're also submitting, you know, different proposals for funding to continue expanding the research component, and we support, as well, for example, to grad students.
So a lot of work in the different aspects of they have in order to get the support, to continue with the mission of the hub.
Particularly in environmental landscape today, where we have, you know, whether uncertainty, economic, uh, ups and downs, I think all the implementation of these agricultural tools and processes can help growers to be more efficient, right?
To try to adjust all the inputs and all the labors that they are doing, to be able to address all these challenges that they have.
So these agricultural tools is another tool in the toolbox in order to address these challenges.
So the hub has 3 main pillars.
We say, one is the one related to the resource component where UNA has a strong history, as I mentioned, more than 40 teams working in livestock production, robotics, AI, precision nutrient management, how to manage landscape, resources, natural resources.
The 2nd is basically extension, and workforce development, where we are having, or thinking about providing these lighted culture budges in order to get training for students beside the regular training that we are offering, but also for stakeholders, and certify crop advisors, for example.
And the 3rd one is related to entrepreneurship, trying to support internally and externally at UNL, all the teams that are looking to develop new tools, particularly for growers and ranchers across the state.
[Mike Straub, Program Host]
For Nebraska Extension Almanac, I'm Mike Straub.
Nebraska Extension, Almanac is a production of IANR media, and Nebraska Extension.
For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.
Changes to the 2026 ARC/PLC Enrollment
Agricultural producers have a relatively short window to complete their Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) decisions for the 2026 crop year. Nebraska Extension Ag Policy Specialist Brad Lubben says this signup is unusual because producers are making their 2026 election near the end of the growing season rather than before planting.
View Transcript
[Brad Mills, Program Host]
Nebraska Extension Almanac.
We've been examining issues surrounding the upcoming deadline for producers to sign up for the current season's ARC PLC program, which is December 11th.
Nebraska Extension ag policy specialist Brad Lubin continues that discussion by talking about the 2025 program payments that are arriving now, and what producers should keep in mind for the upcoming decisions on the 2026 crop.
[Brad Lubben, Nebraska Extension Ag Policy Specialist}
In the end, this is sort of an academic exercise because producers are going to get paid the higher of Arker PLC.
It's not that that decision back in spring of 2025 was meaningless.
In the end.
We made changes to the program and therefore we made changes to the payment structure.
The reality is it's a reminder of the potential range of outcomes one can see in in arc and PLC payments, arc particularly is, as I said, a function of payment yields or prices and local actual yields.
You can have by practice comparisons where, um, uh, in a good year, maybe non-irrigated outperforms, its benchmark, and, therefore, it ends up that the non-irrigated practice doesn't pay, but the irrigated practice does, or or vice versa.
And so, um, so it's a reminder that, uh, um, your actual production conditions, the local production conditions really matter when you're trying to evaluate the the protection in something like the arc program.
So 2025 gave us a lesson, a reminder on how arc and PLC work, even though ultimately it didn't matter what the choice was. 2026, you have to make the choice, but it is at the end of the growing season.
And so you have, at least expectations about what your actual yields end up being, what the county yields are weaning toward, for weed producers.
We already have some very solid results of what either farm or county numbers looked like.
You may have better insight on the yield component of the arc equation, which means you can, you can do a better job of estimating whether the art program really provides substantial support yet for the remainder of the marketing year, or whether it, uh, you know, in counties with strong yield results.
Arc may get pushed sort of out of the money and not offer much downside support in counties with average to below average yield results, Arc could pay substantially.
PLC could pay substantially, if prices drop from where we currently project them.
Now, I'm not confident in any sort of price projections.
I'm not the market analyst to want to put those out there, and I certainly wouldn't be very confident in a projected price in October for a marketing year that just got started.
But if you look at USDA supply and demand reports that they publish every month, there is a projected price in there.
And it represents both a weighted combination of everything that has been marketed to date during the marketing year plus some economic projection of what's ahead.
By the way, the analysis that I wrote up in the cap article was based on September numbers from USDA supply and demand report, with a 480 per bushel projected price compared to a PLC program that would trigger it 442 or an arc program that would trigger it, say, 453 assuming benchmark or trend yields.
Since I wrote that article.
USDA did release their October supply and demand estimates, and they took a dime off of the corn, grain sorghum, and wheat projections.
So suddenly those programs are already looking a little bit stronger than they were even last month.
Uh, for the wheat program.
In fact, it even means we went from being slightly out of the money to slightly in the money.
And that matters to producers trying to figure out how these programs pay.
[Brad Mills, Program Host}
Today's program was a portion of an interview taken from a recent farmcast podcast offered by UNL Center for Ag Profitability, to read the detailed article, or listen to the entire interview, go to cap.unl.edu, or download from Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
For Nebraska Extension Almanac.
I'm Brad Mills.
Nebraska Extension Almanac is a production of IANR Media and Nebraska Extension.
For more information on how your university is serving Nebraskans, go to extension.unl.edu.