Ethanol will help??? The cost of producing ethanol will just go up along with oil.
Read this, from USA Today
Farmers scrape around for corn seed as ethanol-fueled prices mean big demand
Farmers are looking for a bumper crop of corn this year as interest in ethanol brings attention.
By Jeff Cook, Quad-City Times via AP
Farmers are looking for a bumper crop of corn this year as interest in ethanol brings attention.
By Chris Woodyard, USA TODAY
Soaring prices are enticing farmers to plant the biggest corn crop in 60 years because of the boom in demand for ethanol as a gas-stretching fuel additive.
With planting due to begin in the next few weeks across the Midwest corn belt, some of the most popular hybrid seed is already in short supply. Experts are divided about how much higher corn prices will tack onto consumers' food and fuel tabs. The government says the higher corn acreage will mean less soybean and cotton production, which could raise prices for those commodities as well.
With corn prices predicted to hit records, growers will plant as much as 13% more corn than last year. At 88.5 million acres, 2007's crop would mark the most corn acreage since the mid-1940s and the single biggest one-year jump in memory, says Chris Hurt, agricultural economist at Purdue University. The official Agriculture Department survey is expected Friday.
"It's a tremendous time," says Ken McCauley, president of the National Corn Growers Association, himself a farmer in White Cloud, Kan. Farmers shouldn't fear a price bust. "We're telling our growers to look at the market and not be scared of it," he says.
The swing to corn is pressuring two of the biggest seed suppliers. Monsanto told customers about three weeks ago that it is sold out of one of its top hybrids. And DuPont-owned Pioneer Hi-Bred, the No. 1 corn seed supplier, reports that farmers who didn't buy late last year may not get their top choice.
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