- Nebraska wheat harvest underway
- Gregory Geortz new Wyoming FSA Director
- IANR Update
- Beef Checkoff Update
- Rocky Mountain Pack string in Crawford for the 4th!
- CCC Rates Announced for July
- CSP Signup Expected Soon
- Extension of RFS-2 Comment Period Concerns NBB
- EPA Approves California’s Long-Requested Pollution Rule Waiver
- Michigan Legislators Pushing for Livestock Standards
- Senate Plans to Move on Climate Change with Lessons Learned from House
- Derrel Carruth named Wyoming Rural Development Director
- Biden announces $4 billion in rural broadband service
- 4-H Animal science event
- USDA, KDA stress food safety during holiday weekend
- Branded funds available
- Interview on ACRE
- ACRE Webinar Draws More Than a Thousand
- Soy Transportation Coalition publishes Semi Weight Analysis
- Webster County Fair is near
- Kansas Wheat Harvest Report
- Environmental officials to discuss sludge probe
- 3 community colleges sue Kan. Board of Regents
- Vilsack Announces New Focus, Approach to Food Security
- Study Shows Spraying Herbicides on Invasive Weeds Not Necessarily Good Idea
- Tyson Responds to R-CALF, Not Meeting Request
- Corn-Fed Beef Trade Mission Wraps Up in Korea
- Growth Energy Says USDA Crop Report Dismisses Myths
- Governor Dave Heineman interview
- Bill Bullard interview
- Recent Reports Thrill Nation’s Corn Growers
- Jon Bruning interview on Republican River ruling
- Central Platte NRD conducts tour
- Greater Corn Supplies Could Lead to Higher Ethanol Blend Rate
- Water referee says Neb. owes Kan. $10,000
- Farm Bureau Asks USDA for Immediate Help
- Polansky moves to Kansas FSA Director
- Kansas wheat harvest moves northward
- Obama team members to fan out on summer rural tour
- Yet more waiting for Neb., Kan. in river dispute
“Corn prices have dropped by about half since earlier this year, yet food prices have remained high and are expected by some to remain high,” Tolman noted. With commodity and energy costs now significantly lower, it’s time for food companies to take a hard look at the prices they’ve increased – often, for smaller packages designed to look like the larger-sized packages.
“Ethanol is an important part of America’s balanced energy sector and needs to play a bigger part if we are to reduce our dependence on foreign oil with a fuel source that is home-grown and renewable,” Tolman said. “At this time of economic crisis, U.S. ethanol production supports jobs and communities in rural America while boosting our nation’s gross domestic product and paying its share of taxes to fund important government programs.”
Tolman also laid out the many ways in which corn farmers are becoming more efficient in their use of fertilizers and pesticides, and reducing the impact on land through conservation tillage practices. Thanks to technology and improver agronomy, Tolman said, growers are boosting their production per acre significantly, and are expected to increase it each year well into the future with new corn hybrids in the pipeline that will reduce the need for nitrogen and provide drought-tolerant corn.
“We’re seeing great strides being made in corn production, thanks in great part to technology,” Tolman said. “While we are growing corn on about the same acreage as back in the 1940s, we’ve seen production more than quadruple. Back then, you would have needed a farm the size of Texas, Louisiana and New Mexico to grow that much corn.”
The Economics of Ethanol conference was sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis; Washington University’s Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government and Public Policy; and the university’s International Center for Advanced Renewable Energy and Sustainability. It included presentations and discussions on the profitability of corn ethanol processing, the costs and benefits of corn ethanol as a fuel source, the impact of the ethanol boom on rural America, and the future of biofuels.
© 2008 The Nebraska Rural Radio Association. All rights reserved.
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