Best Farm Insurance in Australia: 6 Insurers Compared

How to actually compare farm insurance

Comparing farm insurance is different from comparing car or home insurance. There's no standard product. Every farm pack is priced and structured individually, and the things that matter most — what's excluded, how sub-limits apply, what the flood clause says — often don't show up in an online quote tool.

The right way to compare: understand which underwriters are active in your category, what their policies actually cover, and where they diverge on the things most likely to cause you a problem. Then get quotes through a specialist broker who can access more than one product.

This guide covers what each major insurer offers in 2026 and where they're strongest, so you can make an informed decision before you choose.

WFI (Insurance Australia Group)

WFI has been writing rural insurance since 1919 and is now the dominant force in Australian farm insurance following IAG's consolidation of its rural book under this brand. After both NRMA and CGU exited farm insurance on 1 July 2025, they directed their customers toward WFI — which tells you clearly where IAG is placing its bets on rural.

WFI covers the full range: hobby farms through to large broadacre operations, cattle stations, dairies, and horticultural properties. Their farm pack includes property and buildings, livestock, crops, farm machinery, farm motor, and public liability. Key features on their livestock policies include restoration costs, humane destruction cover, and carcass removal — practical benefits that most farmers don't think to compare until they need them.

WFI's Early Bird Crop Insurance covers grain crops against fire, hail, adverse weather, livestock intrusion, stored seed risks, and chemical escape. They're available direct and through brokers.

Strongest for: Broadacre farming, cattle, mixed operations, hobby farms. The go-to option for former NRMA and CGU customers.

Elders Insurance (QBE)

Elders Insurance has been covering Australian farms for over 100 years. QBE is the product issuer and insurer behind the Elders Farm Pack, which covers property, livestock, machinery, crops, liability, and vehicles. What sets Elders apart operationally is its network of local agents — people who typically know your district and your farming conditions. For many rural communities, the Elders agent relationship predates the farmer's ownership of the property.

Their farm liability policies offer flexible limits starting at $10 million. Elders crop cover addresses hail, fire, livestock intrusion, chemical overspray, and in-transit losses. Available through Elders agents and QBE-authorised brokers.

Strongest for: Mixed farming, livestock, properties where a local agent relationship matters. A strong second option for anyone comparing against WFI.

Achmea

Achmea is the most distinctive underwriter in this market. Dutch-owned, they don't operate through a call centre or online quote system — they send a representative to physically inspect your property before writing the policy. This approach produces more accurately priced cover and fewer disputes at claim time, because the insurer actually knows what they've agreed to cover.

Achmea covers livestock, horticulture, broadacre, mixed farming, stud stock, protected cropping, and intensive operations. Their standout feature in 2025-26 is that they build flood cover into their standard farm policies as a default — most other underwriters exclude it or require it to be added at extra cost.

If your property is in a catchment with any realistic flood risk, this distinction is worth understanding carefully. Being covered for storm damage but not riverine flooding is one of the most common and expensive gaps in Australian farm insurance, and Achmea's default inclusion directly addresses it.

Strongest for: Properties with flood risk, high-value livestock and stud operations, horticulture and protected cropping, and any farmer who values an insurer that understands their property from an on-site visit.

Nutrien Ag Solutions

Nutrien is one of Australia's largest agricultural companies and operates as an Authorised Representative of Marsh Advantage Insurance. Their broking teams have been embedded in rural communities for over 150 years. Because they act as a broker rather than a direct insurer, they can access multiple underwriters and put your risk out to competing quotes — which typically produces better pricing than any single direct product can offer consistently.

Nutrien's value is in their rural expertise and their ability to compare. For a complex operation — one with multiple insurable assets, multiple risk categories, and meaningful exposure in several sections — having someone who can actually shop the market is worth more than any one insurer's standard offering.

Strongest for: Broadacre, mixed farming, operations where competitive quoting across underwriters is important.

Gallagher (AJG Australia)

Gallagher is a major international insurance broker with over 30 branches across Australia and genuine depth in broadacre, cotton, viticulture, and horticulture. Like Nutrien, they act as a broker and access multiple underwriters on your behalf. Gallagher's scale means access to specialist markets and the ability to place more complex or high-value risks that a local agent might struggle to price competitively.

Strongest for: Horticulture, viticulture, cotton, large broadacre operations, and any property with complex or high-value risk that benefits from market access at scale.

What happened to NRMA and CGU?

Both NRMA and CGU stopped writing farm insurance on 1 July 2025. This includes their hobby farm and rural farm products. Both brands directed existing customers toward WFI. If you were previously with either insurer, it's worth confirming exactly what you've been moved onto and whether the coverage is genuinely equivalent to what you had. Farm packs differ between insurers in ways that become significant at claim time — particularly around exclusions, sub-limits, and the definition of flood.

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Comparing policies: what actually matters

The premium is the least important number to compare. The things that determine whether an insurance product is right for your operation:

The flood clause

Most standard farm policies exclude flood — meaning inundation from a river breaking its banks. Storm damage is typically covered; flood is not. If your property is in a catchment that has flooded in the past 20 years, you need to read the flood definition in any policy before you buy it. The 2022 flood events across NSW and Queensland produced thousands of claims where the storm damage was covered but the inundation was not — a distinction many farmers discovered for the first time when they filed.

Sub-limits on contents and storage

Your policy might have a high overall insured sum, but sub-limits apply to specific categories within it. Grain in storage, fertiliser, hay, chemicals, and farm contents often have separate caps well below the total policy limit. If you're regularly carrying $200,000 in stored grain and your policy sub-limits it at $50,000, you're exposed — regardless of how high your headline sum insured is.

Livestock disease definitions

Livestock policies typically cover death from named perils — fire, flood, lightning, drowning. Disease is more complicated. Some policies include a disease section; others require you to add it. Even when disease is covered, there are often strict notification timeframes, exclusions for endemic conditions, and definitions that create gaps for specific diagnoses. Read the disease clause before you need it.

The averaging clause and underinsurance

Most farm policies include an averaging (or co-insurance) clause. If your sum insured is below a threshold — typically 80% of replacement cost — the insurer will reduce your claim payout proportionally. A machinery shed worth $400,000 insured for $200,000 means a $150,000 fire claim pays out $75,000. Building and machinery replacement costs have risen sharply since 2021. If your sums insured haven't been updated in the last two to three years, you should review them before renewal.

Farm vehicle definitions

Some farm motor policies only cover vehicles during farm operations, creating a gap when a ute is driven on a public road. Others use a "principal place of use" definition that covers the vehicle wherever it goes as long as it's primarily used on the farm. This distinction matters if your vehicles regularly travel to town, agistment properties, or off-site machinery events.

Direct vs broker: which is better?

Going direct makes sense for a simple hobby farm policy — modest asset value, low complexity, no unusual risks. For anything commercially significant, a specialist broker is almost always the better approach.

A broker who specialises in agricultural cover brings three things a direct insurer can't: access to multiple underwriters (meaning competing quotes, better pricing), specialist knowledge of how policies actually perform at claim time, and someone in your corner if a claim is disputed. The largest farm insurance claims — the ones that threaten the financial viability of the operation — are the ones where having a knowledgeable advocate on your side matters most.

Brokers like Nutrien and Gallagher don't cost more. Broker commissions are paid by the insurer, not the farmer. The question isn't whether you can afford a broker — it's whether you can afford to be without one on a large or complex risk.

Before you choose

Three questions worth answering before you commit to any policy.

Has your property had any flood in the past 20 years, or is it within 10km of a river system that floods? If yes, the flood clause in any policy you're considering is your first thing to read. Don't assume it's covered — confirm it in writing before you buy.

When did you last have your sums insured reviewed against current replacement costs? If it was before 2022, they're almost certainly too low. Machinery, buildings, and structural costs have all risen substantially. Underinsurance doesn't cost you anything at renewal — it costs you at claim time, when you can't do anything about it.

Are you on a product that was written for your farm type, or a generic rural policy that's been adapted? There's a difference between a policy written for a 200-head dairy operation in Gippsland and one written for a 50-hectare lifestyle block. Make sure you're buying what fits, not what's easiest to buy.

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This guide is general information only and does not constitute financial or insurance advice. Farm insurance products vary between insurers. Speak with a licensed insurance broker before making coverage decisions.