TIFTON, Ga. - The Georgia Peanut Commission sent a letter this week requesting the Risk Management Agency to extend the peanut planting deadline for crop insurance by a minimum of ten days. The peanut planting deadline for crop insurance is May 31, 2009.

“Georgia has seen a tremendous amount of rain this spring,” says Don Koehler, Georgia Peanut Commission executive director. “It has caused flooding throughout the peanut belt and has delayed peanut planting in many areas.”

Peanut growers are reporting that their plantings are only forty to fifty percent completed. “With the crop insurance deadline fast approaching, we are concerned that it will put many of our producers in a precarious situation,” Koehler adds.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistics Service Georgia Field Office report on May 26, 2009, rains have slowed planting progress and wet fields have stopped peanut, cotton and soybean planting and field work.

The Georgia Peanut Commission represents the 4,500 peanut growers in Georgia, which is the largest peanut producing state in the nation.