Amid record, ethanol-driven harvest, corn growers dislike criticism over food, environmental issues

The largest corn crop in U.S. history is almost completely harvested, but corn farmers are getting doses of skepticism and criticism with their hefty checks. Joel Achenbach, of one of the best reporters at explaining how things work, writes about it mainly from the growers' point of view The Washington Post today: "Farmers, up to their eyeballs in corn, are wondering what exactly they have done wrong."

High corn prices, driven by the demand for ethanol, have driven up food prices, Achenbach notes. "Environmentalists decry the impact on soil, waterways and wildlife of so much acreage planted in vast tracts of a thirsty, fertilizer-hungry plant. Tens of thousands of acres in Iowa once set aside for conservation were plowed this year for corn. The Iowa landscape is a patchwork of corn and soybean monocultures, with about as much biodiversity as a bachelor's refrigerator. Corn, in the form of high-fructose corn syrup, is even accused of causing the national obesity epidemic."

Achenbach writes from Iowa, where fully one-third of the land was planted in corn this year. His protagonist is Bill Couser (in photo by Andrea Melendez for the Post), who has 5,000 acres in the very center of the state and is chairman of an ethanol distillery. "When we planted this crop," he told Achenbach, "people said we were the villains of the world."(Read more)