As more farms get sued over run-off containing manure and nitrates from manure, getting insurance that will cover such liability is one concern, but eliminating the liability altogether is even more important, and farmers who take steps to limit the liability in the first place will be able to get more affordable insurance, said Dave Dybdahl, president of American Risk Management Resources, a company on the leading edge of providing pollution coverage for farmers.
“What farms need to do to mitigate risk is they have to pay a lot more attention to the chances that what they are doing could impair the environment,” said Dybdahl.
He said most states have “right-to-farm” laws that protect farmers from litigation from neighbors who object to the smells or sounds of farms.
“These laws make it almost impossible for someone to say a farm is a nuisance. The farm was there first. You can’t sue them for the odor of manure. Normal agricultural practices are protected from nuisance claims.”
What’s new, Dybdahl said, is the understanding that right-to-farm laws are not right to pollute laws. “Right-to-farm laws don’t protect farmers from federal environmental laws. Federal environmental laws trump state right-to-farm laws. This is brand new news to farmers and their agents. So the farmers have to pay closer attention to pollution prevention. The ones I have talked to seem oblivious to the topic of groundwater pollution. They seem to have no awareness at all, and that is where the big dollar claims come in. So it is a liability that they are not even thinking about, and this liability is at magnitudes much greater than anything they have thought about in the past,” Dybdahl said.
In the past, Dybdahl said, a small farmer’s worst exposure was if their farm tractor caused an auto accident. “Well, those tractors don’t spend much time on the road,” he said.
“
Farmers now face bigger liabilities than they or their agents have ever had to deal with. Exclusions are difficult for people to get a handle on. People grossly underestimate the effect of exclusions.”
This is the third in 4-part series on pollution-related litigation against farms. The final installment will be published April 27.
