SAGE, Aon, AgriCap team up on AI-priced crop insurance

The idea of using crop insurance to reward farmers for risk-reducing practices is not new. During his tenure as USDA undersecretary for Farm Production and Conservation, Bonnie explored insurance products that could recognize the benefits of regenerative agriculture, but the department lacked the ability to pick landowners out of the risk pool and understand their individual risk. More powerful AI tools in the past few years have changed those capabilities, letting SAGE combine soil, water, weather and management data with agricultural process models.

SAGE worked with Aon through approximately six months of testing and analysis to evaluate the technology's ability to assess agricultural risk. Aon already has an established agricultural insurance business and has reported placing agricultural insurance business in nearly 50 countries, while AgriCap will serve as the insurance partner responsible for bringing the product to market. Veghte stressed that eligibility will be determined field by field, so even fields in counties with relatively high production risks could qualify if their individual risk is lower than the county average.

Alongside the insurance product, SAGE plans to provide participating farmers with access to its SAGE Almanac, an AI-powered agronomic information tool that Veghte described as a dynamic agronomic report incorporating individual field conditions, historical weather and crop production. SAGE has been testing the technology across tens of thousands of acres in the Corn Belt, and the company also plans to make the Almanac available beyond farmers purchasing its insurance product.