IL CORN PRIORITY ISSUES SHARED

Tricia Braid

Dec 05, 2012  |  Today's News

Illinois Corn’s priority issue and work areas were shared with farmers attending the Illinois Farm Bureau Annual Meeting this week. The Panama Canal and U.S. waterways issues, crop insurance changes, regulatory challenges, threats to ethanol and the Renewable Fuel Standard, and the Illinois Farm Families program were the subject matter areas that IL Corn addressed. All of these issues are priority areas for Illinois Corn Growers Association and/or the Illinois Corn Marketing Board. .

Regarding the Panama Canal and waterways issue, ICMB sponsored speakers from Informa Economics and from the Waterways Council, Inc., to address the crowd. The room was filled to capacity with those that asked many questions of the experts. Interesting points to note? The Panama Canal will be finished ahead of schedule and under budget, sometime in 2014. And when the Mississippi River closes to barge traffic, perhaps as early as next week, it will take more than 170,000 rail cars or over 742,000 trucks to carry the cargo capacity of the river in a 60 day period.