Can you still harvest your crops after the cut-off date?

The cut-off date stops new claims. It does not take away a crop you already had in the ground. Anything standing at the cut-off should be compensated, and where possession is taken before you can harvest, you should be either given notice to harvest or paid for the crop you lose.

What the cut-off actually does

It fixes eligibility. Assets recorded in the census before that date are compensable; things planted or built afterwards, once the date has been properly disclosed, are not — because otherwise the announcement of a project becomes an invitation to plant for compensation.[1]

That rule is about new assets. A field you have farmed for years does not stop being yours because a date passed.

The gap that causes most disputes

Enumeration happens at one point and possession often years later. In between, seasons pass and fields get planted again — because a household that stops farming for two years while waiting has no income.

Whether those later crops are compensated depends on what the project told you. Two positions are defensible: give notice long enough for the standing crop to be harvested, or compensate the standing crop at possession. What is not defensible is clearing a planted field on the basis that the crop postdates the cut-off, without notice, which produces the most visible grievance a project can have.[2]

What to do

1. Ask, in writing, what the rule is for crops planted after the cut-off and before possession. Ask before you plant.
2. Ask for notice of the possession date — enough of it to take a harvest.
3. Photograph and date your planting, so what was standing when is not a matter of memory.
4. Raise it as a grievance immediately if a field is cleared with a crop in it and no notice was given.

Perennials are a different case

A tree planted after the cut-off is a new asset. A mature tree that existed before it should have been recorded by species and maturity class, and it is worth the cost of establishing a replacement plus the years of yield until it bears — not one season's fruit.[3]

If the record shows only a count and no maturity class, ask for it to be re-checked before the trees are cleared. After clearance it cannot be established.[4]