Robertson Alison Robertson Professor of Plant Pathology and Microbiology Dr. Alison Robertson is an associate professor of plant pathology and microbiology. She provides ex, Alison, and Gary Munkvold. “Potential Disease Problems in Corn Following Corn.” Potential Disease Problems in Corn Following Corn | Integrated Crop Management, 2021, crops.extension.iastate.edu/encyclopedia/potential-disease-problems-corn-following-corn.

Due to environmental conditions corn is a crop that is vulnerable to infections by plant pathogens, that includes but is not limited to; seed rots and seedling blights that have been brought upon by fungal species, stalk rots, foliar diseases, and ear rots.  The fungi that cause many of these diseases “survive in crop residue on the soil surface and also in the soil, and their populations will be higher in corn-on-corn fields. Thus, there is an increased risk of some of these diseases in corn-following-corn fields” Though they are fairly harmless in a large scale of the corn industry these fungi have the potential to spread to corn and as well as soybean plantations causing havok to the crops until contained. 

This article goes over corn diseases that have a large potential of affecting the corn industry. These diseases are fungal species, stalk rots, foliar diseases, and ear rots. The article goes over each of the desises, their cause, and how it affects the corn, and how it spreads. Many of these diseases such as stalk rot and ear rot have similar causes (as in fungi spreading through soil). This article also explains how the environment can cause these diseases and how these diseases in turn hurt the environment. As previously stated these “plant pathogens” have a negative effect on the environment by killing off crops and having the potential to wreak havoc on corn plantations throughout all of the United States.

Gloy, Brent, and David Wimar. “Are You Betting on Corn in 2021.” Michigan Farm News, 17 Mar. 2021, www.michiganfarmnews.com/are-you-betting-on-corn-in-2021-.

When farmers think of investing in a crop such as corn they must also consider the other options that they have at hand, specifically soybeans. Why might a farmer invest in soybeans over corn, and is it worth it in 2021? Well “the 2021 Purdue crop budgets have variable costs at $436 for corn and $249 for soybeans”, therefore farmers would have less money invested in soybeans. Furthermore “the chance of generating less than $300 per acre is about 20% under corn, but only about 8% for soybeans”. To sum it up there are many factors that one has to look into when deciding in planting/ investing soybeans vs corn, but at the moment soybeans is a more economically safe crop to bet on. Though this does not mean that planting corn is a bad investment, think of it as if a poker player had the crops as their cards. “For 2021, the crop insurance price ratio favors soybeans slightly more than the last time we observed a roughly even acreage split between corn and soybean. However, the poker player considers more than just the cards in their hand – their chip count, the size of the bet, etc. Similarly, producers will also be considering the overall economic environment and the potential payout for betting on corn.”

I enjoyed reading this article due to the fact that it provides a lot of overthought information such as how each farmer has to make individual decisions about each crop that they intend on investing in. Through researching the economy of corn It has been shown that corn is not the most economically viable crop in 2021, and that it is outmatched by soybeans. The article summarizes many of the economic upsides as well as downfalls of choosing corn over soybeans, what it means, and how corn may take an impact. This article also supplies visual evidence of the differences of prices and the distribution of outcomes for the contribution margins of corn and soybeans.

Quinn, Lauren. “Going Back in Time Restores Decades of QUIET Corn Drama.” ScienceDaily, ScienceDaily, 16 Mar. 2021, www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/03/210316132052.htm.

“Corn didn’t start out as the powerhouse crop it is today”. Only through the technological advances from the green revolution did corn become a prominent crop. Though corn is a “powerhouse crop” it may not be as much of a good thing as it sounds. Corn as a crop uses microbes as a means to grow faster as well as “fixing nitrogen in the soil and making it available for crops to take up”. More recently corn “has been increasingly recruiting ‘bad’ microbes. These are the ones that help synthetic nitrogen fertilizers and other sources of nitrogen escape the soil, either as potent greenhouse gases or in water-soluble forms that eventually end up in the Gulf of Mexico and contribute to oxygen-starved ‘dead zones.’” Through breeding and natural selection are able to bring “back the ability for corn to recruit its own nitrogen fixation system which would allow producers to apply less nitrogen fertilizer, leading to less nitrogen loss from the system overall.”

This article shows that corn, though being a very widespread domesticated crop is able to cause unforeseen problems to the surrounding environment, especially the surrounding soil. Though these problems are becoming more prominent, our modern technology is able to quickly and efficiently detect issues with the soil and also discover “bad microbes” that reduce the synthetic nitrogen within the soil. Furthermore we are able to reduce, if not eliminate this problem by breeding the corn that produces the least amount of the bad microbes.

“Sustainability.” National Corn Growers Association, National Corn Growers Association, 7 June 2021, www.ncga.com/key-issues/current-priorities/sustainability. 

The NCGA (National Corn Growth Association) was founded in 1957 and “represents nearly 40,000 dues-paying corn farmers nationwide and the interests of more than 300,000 growers who contribute through corn checkoff programs in their states” The NCGA has a mission to “Create and increase opportunities for corn growers” as well as “Sustainably feed and fuel a growing world”. In particular they put most of their focus on the sustainability of corn. They claim that through a network of stewardship for corn along with “advances in science, technology and precision equipment, growers are focused more than ever on improving resiliency and efficiency” the NCGA would be able to Increase land use efficiency by 12%, reduce soil erosion by 13%, Increase energy use by 13%, decrease GMO productions by 13%, and increase water efficiency by 15%, by the year 2030. 

I agree with what the NGCA is trying to do by paying corn farmers, researching issues, and finding/ funding solutions to potential problems when it comes to corn. Though through not only the article but the website it is difficult to find how change will happen, instead of what change what change may possibly happen. In other words the NCGA does little explaining on what it’s going to do to make changes. What the NCGA does is make claims of change with no evidence or process to back it up, making the impression of empty promises.

Marie, Adriane. “Is Corn Good Or BAD?: 2021 Ingredient Guide for Health, Environment, Animals, Laborers.” HEALabel, HEALabel, 11 Aug. 2021, healabel.com/c-ingredients/corn. 

“Is corn good or bad for you; your health, appearance, energy, longevity? Is corn sustainable; good or bad for the environment? Is corn associated with labor concerns?” Corn has been shown to have more benefits to one’s health, for example corn helps aid digestion as well as improving one’s eye health. Though the consumption of corn may lead to the lack of nutrient absorption in the body. Environment wise the production of corn has a fairly high water footprint, it consumes about 146 gallons of water per 2.2 pounds of corn, furthermore corn depletes nitrogen along with other crucial nutrients from soil which causes very poor soil quality. This means that “farmers must use chemical fertilizers to encourage plant growth.” These chemicals along with pesticides accumulate in ground weather which then becomes airborne. 

This article from healabel contains lots of information one must need about corn. It is split into multiple sections, with each section having lots of specialized information about a specific corn topic. I like this article because not only does it give lots of information, it explains how it helps/ hurts people and the environment. Furthermore this text shows how corn is harmful for the environment because of its nutrient consumption, and how it forces farmers to use chemical fertilizer.