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You Don't Eat "Ethanol Corn"
Boy, oh boy. There's a lot of confusion when it comes to corn, ethanol, and food supply. Some politicians and food companies would like you to believe that corn is ripped off the grocery shelves and turned into ethanol. Not so. In fact, the corn on your table and the corn in your gas tank are two totally different kinds. Let's look at both types.
Field corn is grown on more than 99% of all corn acres. (Ethanol production has not chaged this ratio.) While a small portion is processed for use as corn cereal, corn starch, corn oil and corn syrup for human consumption, it is primarily used for livestock feed, ethanol production, and other manufactured goods. It’s considered a grain, not food. (Scroll down to see how field corn is used.)
- 93.6 million planted acres
- 13.1 billion bushels produced,
(366 million tons) - Crop Value: $52.3 billion
Sweet corn is what you purchase fresh, frozen or canned for eating. It’s eaten as a vegetable. Unlike field corn, which is harvested when the kernels are dry and fully mature, sweet corn is picked when immature.
- 631,400 planted acres
- 2.9 million tons fresh and • processed
- Crop Value: $625.5 million fresh; $236.9 million processed
What do some of these words mean?
- A bushel of corn is 56 pounds, about the weight of a large bag of dog food.
- An acre is about the area of a football field.
- A ton is 2,000 pounds, about the weight of a small car.
How Field Corn Is Used
47% of field corn produced in the United States (6.15 billion bushels*) is as feed for livestock such as beef, pork or poultry.
24% (3.1 billion bushels) is used for ethanol production. Besides the ethanol this produces, this corn also will result in approximately 24 million metric tons of high-protein livestock feed in various forms and about 2.5 million pounds of corn oil.
19% (2.5 billion bushels) is exported to other countries. The top five countries to which the United States exports corn are Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Taiwan and Egypt.
10% of the corn (1.4 billion bushels) goes to other food, seed and industrial uses. Field corn is a source of corn cereal, corn starch, corn oil and corn syrup. Hundreds of other products are also derived from corn, such as certain plastic packaging and even fabrics. In addition, about 9% of the total corn supply (currently 1.3 billion bushels) is carried over as a surplus for the next year.
This and subsequent figures are from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, April 2008. A metric ton is 1,000 kilograms, approximately 2,205 pounds.
Sources
Illinois Corn Growers Association