Newsroom

Exports and Value-Added Agriculture

Farmers live in a changing economy and face many situations in which they have no control - prices, weather and disease. This requires many decisions: what crops to grow, which seeds to buy, how to grow them and get the best yield per acre, how to get crops to market, as well as how to find new uses for corn and soybeans.

The U.S. exports corn to over 100 countries.

Loading grain barges on the Mississippi River
Iowa is a major contributor to the corn market. Most of U.S. corn is transported down the Mississippi River and through the port of New Orleans.

U.S. corn exports supply top markets such as Japan, Taiwan, Mexico, South Korea, and Egypt. Even smaller markets import a lot of U.S. corn including countries in Central America and nations in the Caribbean.

What is value-added agriculture?
Value-added agriculture transforms crops and livestock into products of greater value.Value-added agriculture is increasing the economic value of an agricultural commodity through changes in genetics, processing or diversification.Value-added agriculture means taking crops such as corn or soybeans and livestock such as cattle, hogs, turkeys, chickens, or sheep and adding more uses to them to give them more value, increase job opportunities and expand agricultural markets.Value-Added ExampleThe Kool-Aide StandA packet of unmixed Kool-Aide might be worth 25 cents, and one cup of sugar is another 25 cents. The water used to make the Kool-Aide is 1 cent. By processing these ingredients and marketing them they become "value-added." A pitcher of Kool-Aide may bring $3 when marketed at 25 cents per cup, and the ingredients cost 51 cents.

As a leading agricultural processing state, Iowa transforms millions of bushels of corn into value-added products such as corn oil, starches, sweeteners and animal feed ingredients, much of it for export.

One hundred countries buy U.S. processed corn products, including nations as distant as Swaziland, Kazakhstan, and French Polynesia as reported by the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Iowa poultry, pork and beef (fed with Iowa corn) are exported around the globe.

Other value-added products are made from corn such as hand cleaner, graffiti remover, candles, and plastic silverware.

Iowa's most widely known value-added product is ethanol, a corn-based fuel blended into gasoline.