The redneck strike again.

[The Grand Nudger]

There isn't any excess corn to be got rid of. From that NYT article again

Well, there's always -some-..but there was once a whole lot more. We've made very good use is all. You're putting the cart before the horse.

The corn is being grown for factory farming feed. This means less land available for human food crops. When you can't grow enough human food crops to feed the population it has to be imported from elsewhere.

That's what we use it for -now-...but how we got ourselves into this mess was getting really lucky with corn crossbreeding going back into the early 20th century. We just got better at growing corn faster than we got better at growing anything else. Once we found ourselves sitting on a mountain of corn (and the yield increases got really impressive in the 40's...which is why factory farming cropped up in the 50's.......) we had to find something to do with it. One of the things we got really good at was getting corn to grow in conditions that other crops wouldn't tolerate, and with a minimum of labor of course- especially in the case of feedcorn..which is often unfit for human consumption, but -is- the most economical use for this or that parcel of land. Unfortunately, "less corn" would not equal more human food crops - until such time as we bring the rest of our crops up to the impressive pedigree that corn is hefting around (but it would mean less food..since there would be less meat)- AND completely overhaul our ag policy.........AND our transportation network......which I doubt is coming down the pipes anytime soon. It's not (in the case of the US) that we couldn't grow our own food..so much as it's actually cheaper to import the food of others..and then sell ours..or produce another product (like feed for cattle).

(in the interests of disclosure, I do this for a living..grow food and try to get people to squauk about changing our food policies and dietary choices..lol)