If you’ve ever drank a soda, eaten a hamburger, or filled up a car with gas,
then you might be surprised to find that you were getting a side of
corn alongside all those things. Corn is all around us in
sometimes the most unexpected forms. I'm Cornelius and
I'll help show you around this crazy corn world.

Corn in America

Corn is one of the most beloved crops in all shapes and sizes. Who doesn’t love corn?
The Corn Belt of the Midwest contributes to a majority of corn produced in the US.
It consists of 13 states: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan,
Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin.

We grow so much corn that it makes up
21% of the global corn supply!
And if you were wondering where
all that corn ends up, then I got you covered.

Types of Corn Usage

Corn primarily ends up in four different buckets: animal feed, ethanol, exports, food.
The majority of this corn is processed into animal feed or ethanol for biofuels.
The remaining is exported or converted into various food products.
Hover over the sections to see how much corn goes where!

It’s pretty crazy all the different ways you can spin a cob of corn.
As with most good things in life, corn is not without its faults.
Let’s take a closer look into how corn
impacts our environment, economy, and health.

Economic Impact

Corn is real big business around here! It’s subsidized by the government to assist farmers and to
keep food prices low in the aisles of our grocery stores. Beef is one common food that has a strong relationship
with the rise in corn production. We can see the price of corn and ground beef has often risen in-sync since the 80s.
Because corn is a common ingredient in animal feed – if the price of their food rises, then so does ours.

Did you know that 26% of global green
emissions come from food production?

Environmental Impact

These emissions come from current livestock farms and fisheries, crop production, land use, supply chain practices
and standards. How has cheap corn affected the world it sprouted from? Corn is a strong driver in
our food supply system - that animal feed from earlier makes it easier to raise large amounts of livestock
and fish for mass consumption. To keep these items cheap, we have to continue producing corn to sustain this
cycle but at the risk of increasing environmental damage.

Health Impact

In the last 50 years, average corn consumption has doubled in our daily diets. How did that happen exactly?
Well, corn is quite the chameleon as we've seen. It takes on so many identities from cornstarch and corn
syrup to dextrose and fructose. These corn derivatives have found their way into everyday foods. Bread,
jams, ketchup, and potato chips are just a few! If you think about what you ate today, there’s a high chance
there was some type of corn ingredient in there somewhere.
Hover over to see on average how much corn we're consuming!

This isn’t to shame corn in the end. It can be a healthy
part of a balanced diet, but overconsumption
of processed corn products has been linked
to various chronic health issues.

Takeaways

As much as we love corn, and with all good things, it’s not always golden. Our connection
to corn is complex; it’s neither good nor bad. It simply has become a staple of our
modern lifestyles. Knowing this is powerful – corn is here to stay and being aware
of its impacts can help inform our future choices.

Beyond the Cob