This week's $4.8 billion merger of Corn Products International and Bunge Ltd. probably didn't catch your eye, but with revenues projected to increase 29 percent this year to $4 billion, you might consider paying attention -- for the sake of your belly and the environment.
Corn syrup manufacturers are going on the offensive -- and that includes a charm offensive. The Corn Refiners Association -- an industry trade group -- launched a new marketing campaign yesterday that coincided with the announcement of the multi-billion dollar merger.
Corn syrup is trying to clean up its image, but its glossy, interactive website won't work. In an era when two-thirds of Americans are overweight, it's about time we start to re-examine food policy. Surprisingly, (or not, depending on how closely you follow America's convoluted food system) it all comes back to corn. We produce so much corn (heavily subsidized by our tax dollars) that we are feeding it to our cows, turning it into fuel, and developing sweeteners and additives that are pervasive in packaged and processed foods. The average American eats more than 14 tablespoons of sugar a day and an increasing amount of sweeterners is coming from corn syrup. So I am forced to ask: why are we subsidizing the obesity of our own country?
More than 76 million acres of corn are cultivated annually in the United States. Of overall U.S. production, 43 percent will be fed to livestock, more than 20 percent will be turned into ethanol, and most of the remainder will become high fructose corn syrup, corn oil and a host of other corn-based additives and starches destined to end up in foods such as the heavily processed, over-packaged Ring Ding. Yet, the consequences of producing so much corn don't end at our own belt buckles. While the government spends billions to subsidize food that adds weight to our bellies, they simultaneously fund destruction of America's fertile land.
The environmental impact of growing all of this corn is simply astounding. Aside from industrial animal production, there is no food raised that is more destructive than industrial corn. Every year, this corn is sprayed with 162 million pounds of chemical pesticides. The production, packaging, and transport of these pesticides contribute 2.7 billion pounds of greenhouse gases to the environment every year. An estimated 17.8 billion pounds of synthetic fertilizers are used on our corn every year -- more than any other crop -- contributing an additional 35 billion pounds of greenhouse gas emissions. When you add harvesting, processing, and water pollution from agricultural runoff, you've got one big carbon footprint. It derives almost completely from animals, corn syrup and preservatives.
The funny thing about corn is that most of the kind that we grow in this country doesn't directly feed people. (Having grown up in Northern Maryland, I learned that when I got hungry while playing in corn fields next to my house.) Industrial corn grown for animals and corn byproducts does not taste at all like the corn we eat. The delicious sweet corn we all cherish during summer months is only a small percentage of corn grown domestically. Farm stand corn has a minimal environmental impact, and its nutritional value can not be disputed. Unfortunately, its industrial cousin seems to have gained all the fame -- at least in the eyes of corporations and agri-business investors.
Like a growing number of Americans, I am swearing off corn-syrup and as many corn byproducts as possible. You can reduce your own "FoodPrint" by not buying over-packaged foods and processed foods containing byproducts from corn grown with pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, and a lot of fuel. By giving up corn-sweetened and preserved foods, you'll also, hopefully, be opting for more whole foods, which are better for your health and the environment. Organic alternatives may still contain corn products but at least you'll know you are buying something that was grown without pesticides, herbicides and other non-organic inputs that pollute soil and waterways.
The Corn Refiners Association spent a lot of money on their marketing campaign, but their slogan "Time for a little food for thought -- isn't it?" feels ironic. It is time for some food for thought, but why don't we think about why we are growing so much corn in the first place? What will our society and environment actually gain?
Forget high-fructose corn syrup: I'm sticking to organic cane sugar, because, well, corn just isn't that sweet.
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Comments
View as Flat
JMG Posted 2:59 am
27 Jun 2008
Some coastal woes begin far inland
Farm runoff creates dead zones offshore, but no national authority is tasked to address them.
http://www.elabs5.com/ct.html?rtr=on&s=o1l,2j6l,er,8o ...
The 5% Project
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Sam Wells Posted 4:15 am
27 Jun 2008
Heirloom corn has a long history in the Americas, with many kinds from Mexico to Canada. True, it germinated and fruited unevenly and had to be hand picked, but that stuff at least had some taste - indeed, some say that good corn is like a fine wine. There were dozens of kinds, not just "Indian corn" as we would otherwise think. Some were better for eating (white corn) roasting, grits, preserving, or even making whiskey.
These more native kinds of corn were much more tolerant of the bugs, weather, and the fungus but had to use better prepared soil and greater spacing, although fields had to have over a hundred stalks to properly germinate. Many of these heirloom varietals have been lost but a few afficiandos take great pride in bringing them back on organic farms. The fact that the product is not uniform and closely planted makes it more drought and water tolerant - and taste like heaven.
Many people have no clue that corn should even have a fine taste, with that yellow cow corn they pass off these days. One problem with NAFTA and flooding the Mexico market with US corn (at very high prices) is that native species of Mexico corn, some centuries old, are now being lost due to lack of seed. Ah, anybody for some of the treasured huitlacoche, corn smut? It lends an earthy, mushroomy taste to gormet dishes. -sam
Onward through the fog
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John former Marine Posted 4:54 am
27 Jun 2008
Shu pas a vende.
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abby9280 Posted 5:00 am
27 Jun 2008
The negative publicity given to alternative fuels is a MAJOR setback for clean, sustainable energy production. While the corn industry is fighting to clear its name in order to ensure its continued business success, interest and investment in biofuels as a whole is in jeopardy. This is more than a business problem - it is an environmental and social setback.
A large portion of the population now views biofuels as nothing more than trouble, while many are unaware that biofuels can be produced from non-corn feedstocks. Right now, it is of utmost importance to push information about using switchgrass, algae, jatropha, agricultural wastes, and forestry industry byproducts as energy sources.
This will be no easy task, and the media will be more important than ever in making sure that facts are presented to the public, instead of smear campaigns.
Here is a link to a commendable story that attempts to do just that. And please, whenever you can, even if it's by bringing it up around the water cooler at the office, try to get the word out and make sure people are informed!
http://www.biobasednews.com/node/16462
("Biofuels Not Just About Corn")
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abby9280 Posted 5:01 am
27 Jun 2008
The negative publicity given to alternative fuels is a MAJOR setback for clean, sustainable energy production. While the corn industry is fighting to clear its name in order to ensure its continued business success, interest and investment in biofuels as a whole is in jeopardy. This is more than a business problem - it is an environmental and social setback.
A large portion of the population now views biofuels as nothing more than trouble, while many are unaware that biofuels can be produced from non-corn feedstocks. Right now, it is of utmost importance to push information about using switchgrass, algae, jatropha, agricultural wastes, and forestry industry byproducts as energy sources.
This will be no easy task, and the media will be more important than ever in making sure that facts are presented to the public, instead of smear campaigns.
Here is a link to a commendable story that attempts to do just that. And please, whenever you can, even if it's by bringing it up around the water cooler at the office, try to get the word out and make sure people are informed!
http://www.biobasednews.com/node/16462
("Biofuels Not Just About Corn")
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Sam Wells Posted 5:39 am
27 Jun 2008
And easy on those processed goods like Frito-Lay corn chips, OK tubby?
Onward through the fog
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MAD MAC Posted 1:47 am
01 Jul 2008
Victory in Pattani
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amazingdrx Posted 2:17 am
01 Jul 2008
The starch is used to fatten animals, the fat fed to humans. So agrichem corn is designed to make us profitable patients for the medical industry, hehey.
The reason for fertilizer run off from corn, creating aquatic dead zones, and huge GHG release from corn growing is chemical fertilizer.
Corn fertilized with organic recycled fertilizer from biodigestion reverses GHG climate change many different ways.
Corn grown organically with renewable electric robots, would beat regular corn growing on every front. Now if the subsidies could only be shifted? Ag/energy policy GHG reduction and reversal go hand in hand.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
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