1.28.2007
The New Gold Rush: How Farmers Are Set to Fuel America's Future (Guardian.co.uk)
Rush to grow corn for ethanol - but is it the best solution for environment?
Ed Pilkington in Churdan, Iowa
Friday January 26, 2007
The Guardian
George Naylor's farm occupies 470 acres of some of the richest agricultural land in the world, alluvial loam deposited by the Wisconsin glacier 10,000 years ago. At this time of year it is a great white void. For miles around there is nothing but snow broken only by the occasional copse or lonely farmstead.
His grandfather, an English migrant from Derbyshire, bought the farm in 1918. Over the years the dictates of the market pushed farmers towards mass production of fewer crops. When George inherited the land in 1976 he had plans for an organic oats farm, but soon found the sums didn't work out.
So, like all his neighbours, he tore down the fences to make way for tractors and harvesting equipment. He doubled his holding to 470 acres by renting a neighbour's land to add economies of scale. Many farmsteads were razed as their owners drifted into the towns and all that was left was row upon row of corn and soya bean. And that's how George's farm came to look as it does today: a flat mattress of green and gold in summer, a great white void in winter.
Recently George has heard his neighbours say they are taking the final step to turn this heartland of the Mid-West into the Cornbelt of America, ending the rotation of corn and soya bean that has become the norm over the past 30 years.
What is motivating George's neighbours is the rising demand for ethanol, a biofuel that is mixed with petrol to bring down prices at the pump and, though not without controversy, to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to global warming.
Even before this week, this was a big growth area. Production of ethanol doubled between 2001 and 2005. The chief economist of the US department of agriculture has called it "the most stunning development in agricultural markets today".
(More ... Guardian Unlimited > Special Report > USA) ¶ 09:53
Ed Pilkington in Churdan, Iowa
Friday January 26, 2007
The Guardian
George Naylor's farm occupies 470 acres of some of the richest agricultural land in the world, alluvial loam deposited by the Wisconsin glacier 10,000 years ago. At this time of year it is a great white void. For miles around there is nothing but snow broken only by the occasional copse or lonely farmstead.
His grandfather, an English migrant from Derbyshire, bought the farm in 1918. Over the years the dictates of the market pushed farmers towards mass production of fewer crops. When George inherited the land in 1976 he had plans for an organic oats farm, but soon found the sums didn't work out.
So, like all his neighbours, he tore down the fences to make way for tractors and harvesting equipment. He doubled his holding to 470 acres by renting a neighbour's land to add economies of scale. Many farmsteads were razed as their owners drifted into the towns and all that was left was row upon row of corn and soya bean. And that's how George's farm came to look as it does today: a flat mattress of green and gold in summer, a great white void in winter.
Recently George has heard his neighbours say they are taking the final step to turn this heartland of the Mid-West into the Cornbelt of America, ending the rotation of corn and soya bean that has become the norm over the past 30 years.
What is motivating George's neighbours is the rising demand for ethanol, a biofuel that is mixed with petrol to bring down prices at the pump and, though not without controversy, to help reduce carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to global warming.
Even before this week, this was a big growth area. Production of ethanol doubled between 2001 and 2005. The chief economist of the US department of agriculture has called it "the most stunning development in agricultural markets today".
(More ... Guardian Unlimited > Special Report > USA) ¶ 09:53
