American Farm Bureau giving Illinois Farm Bureau the boot; IFB taking AFB to court

The American Farm Bureau Federation has voted to terminate the membership of Illinois Farm Bureau Federation, effective Dec. 20.

The vote came Tuesday from the AFBF board of directors, which met following a meeting with IFB and Country Financial executives in Bloomington, Ill. Country and IFB share the same board of directors and executives.

In an email to state presidents on Tuesday, AFBF President Zippy Duvall wrote, “This action is based on IFB’s decision to allow its controlled affiliate company, Country Financial, to eliminate the Farm Bureau membership eligibility requirement for non-farm insurance policyholders in Illinois.”

IFB has about 400,000 members, but only 78,000 of them are considered farmers. AFBF has almost 6 million members and receives $5 in dues per Farm Bureau member.

“The membership decision is expected to cause the loss of hundreds of thousands of Farm Bureau members, to the detriment of Illinois farmers, Illinois county farm bureaus, IFB and the entire Farm Bureau organization,” Duvall said.

In a statement he published in FarmWeekNow.com on Wednesday, Illinois Farm Bureau President Brian Duncan said the bureau filed a lawsuit in McLean County court on Wednesday.

“We believe AFBF is choosing to put our farms, our families and our communities at risk at a time when we need support through federal policy,” Duncan said. “In short, we believe AFBF has chosen to break its promises to Illinois farmers. We have no desire to leave AFBF and we will fight to stay.”