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Tagged: corn

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Agriculture
3:11 pm
Tue November 20, 2012

Drought spells tough times for US corn exporters

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Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
This 20-barge flotilla will be pushed by Ingram towboats from the Upper Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico before the corn and soybeans in the cover-top barges and the metallic ore and shredded rubber in the open barges will be exported overseas.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
A look inside one of the covered corn barges in the flotilla. This barge, which has a fiberglass top that protects the grain from the weather, is holding 1,600 tons of corn.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
First mate Tyler Banicki stands atop a corn barge on a 20-barge flotilla headed to the Gulf of Mexico. To the right, Captain Ed Henleben checks out the Mississippi River. The R. Clayton McWhorter towboat in the rear will push these barges down river.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
Experienced deckhand Billy Vanhorn catches hold of a rope before we check out an empty barge.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
This tank barge carries liquids, like soybean oil, diesel fuel, petroleum and gas.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
One of the smaller tugs that pushes barges into rectangular units in harbors along the Mississippi.
Credit Abbie Fentress Swanson/Harvest Public Media
Grain barges are between 195 and 200 feet long and 35 feet wide.
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While the U.S. remains the world’s biggest supplier of corn, American farmers will lose a portion of the global corn market this year.

The Midwest drought devastated the normally robust corn harvest, which has led to higher corn prices and plummeting corn stocks. In a normal year, the U.S. exports more than 1 billion bushels of corn to markets worldwide, but with low domestic supply it’s a tough year for corn exporters – the USDA predicts U.S. corn exports will be at a 40-year low this year.

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Business Beat
3:35 pm
Wed September 12, 2012

Drought-resistant corn tested; unemployment in women, minorities

Credit CraneStation / Flickr
Corn is facing a tough test during this summer's drought, but a hybrid strain could help production output during waterless times.
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Growing across the Midwest is a strain of hybrid corn that should perform well under the driest conditions. Harvest Public Media’s Rick Fredericksen says this summer’s parched farmland is providing an ideal test.

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Agriculture
3:21 pm
Wed September 12, 2012

Drought-resistant corn faces real-life test

Credit Peter Blanchard / Flickr
Corn has had a tough time thriving in this summer's drought. A new hybrid strain might solve that problem.
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By Rick Fredericksen

The sub-par corn harvest of 2012 is coming in early, after the worst growing conditions in more than 2 decades.

“We’ve been really dry all summer," farmer Bill Simmons says. "I talked to an older gentleman some time ago that said he had taken  47 crops off of his farm and this was about the worst that he’d ever seen it."

Simmons is combining 13-hundred acres of corn on the Clan Farm outside Atlantic, Iowa. Multiple varieties were planted, but one field turned out to be especially interesting: a 300-acre section devoted to AQUAmax, a new drought-resistant product from DuPont Pioneer.

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Agriculture
8:16 am
Tue September 4, 2012

Isaac rains help soybeans in Midwest

Credit Clay Masters / Harvest Public Media
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Several days of rain brought some relief to farmers in the nation's midsection as they contend with the worst drought in the U.S. in decades.

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