Published: July 05, 2008 10:58 pm            

Corn is as good as gold

Corn and soybean futures prices are soaring and Mother Nature is cooperating, which could translate to a lucrative harvest of these suddenly valuable crops in northwest Oklahoma.

Since September, the price of corn has nearly doubled from about $4 to $7.47 a bushel, and soybeans have risen from $10 to about $16 a bushel.

One pretext for the rise in prices is the increase in demand for ethanol fuel, which uses corn as a key ingredient. Roger Gribble, Okla-homa Coopera-tive Extension Service northwest area agronomist, said ethanol is re-sponsible for about $1.50 of the price hike for corn.

Also, June floods in key corn- and soybean-producing states such as Iowa, Indiana, Missouri and Illinois have put upward pressure on prices. All this means Oklahoma’s yield will be crucial come August’s harvest.

“Their misfortune would be our fortune,” said Gribble. “A lot of farmers here never envisioned $7 corn as being an opportunity for them. It is today.”

Gribble estimated 10,000 acres of corn have been planted in Garfield, Grant, Kay and Noble counties this year, and those crops are producing above their normal yield. Gribble said soybean acreage also is up because of the recent price surge.

A recent acreage report released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Service predicted 79 million acres of corn and more than 72 million acres of soybeans will be harvested in the United States this year. In Oklahoma, 350,000 acres of corn were planted this year, up from 320,000 last year, according to NASS. This year, 310,000 acres of soybeans were planted, up from 185,000 last year.

Gribble said northwest Oklahoma’s corn harvest is scheduled for early to mid-August, while soybeans will be collected in late-August.

While harvesters are benefiting from corn’s price increase, consumers at the gas pump have not. As corn surges, the price of corn-based ethanol also rises. VeraSun Energies, an ethanol producer, has delayed construction on three plants because of rising supply prices.

In addition, a ballooning middle class in developing countries, rampant speculation and skyrocketing oil prices have hurt supermarket shoppers. Inflation for foodstuffs in the United States is expected to rise above 5.5 percent in 2008, according to a USDA study.

The problem is worse in poorer countries, where riots have erupted over skyrocketing commodity costs.

As the foodstuffs crisis continues to unfold across the globe, it has become increasingly important this year’s corn and soybean crops be harvested without more weather-related catastrophes, according to agriculture experts.

The United States, which exports about 20 percent of its corn harvest each year, can ill afford to have another catastrophe on the scale of last month’s Midwest floods, they said.

Gribble said his main concern is that temperatures not rise above the century mark, when soybeans lose their ability to pollinate and corn crops begin to fail.