By Lisa Holm
Farmers are facing another difficult stretch of high production costs, low commodity prices and tightening margins. As policymakers consider how to strengthen the farm safety net, the National Farmers Union (NFU) released a proposal in May 2026 advocating for a new federal program called the Inventory Management Soil Enhancement Tool (IMSET).
IMSET is intended to provide farmers with a flexible, voluntary tool to help manage financial risk during periods of low commodity prices. Under the proposal, producers could enroll up to 20% of their qualifying cropland in a one-year conservation contract to plant cover crops or grasslands instead of a cash crop. The goal of this tool would be to give farmers another option when planting every acre may not make economic sense, while at the same time improving soil health and reducing erosion.
In addition to providing producers with greater flexibility, IMSET aims to temporarily reduce planted acreage during periods of oversupply, which in turn would help to strengthen commodity prices. By supporting stronger market prices, the program could also reduce federal outlay on commodity support programs such as Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC), complementing the already existing farm safety net.
To better understand how a program like IMSET might fit into real-world farming decisions, Minnesota Farmers Union spoke with several row-crop farmers from across the state. We asked how they evaluate the profitability of their operation, why they continue farming lower-return ground and whether a voluntary one-year program could be useful in years when the economics of planting are not adding up.
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