Ethanol Mandate Divides Missourian Farmers
US - Farmers in Missouri have been divided by a new ethanol mandate recently implemented.
28 April 2008
1 minute read
According to the Columbia Missourian, it pits corn farmers, who are getting record prices for their grain, against livestock producers, who are struggling to feed their herds.
The news agency reprts that at the center has been a law which requires most Missouri gasoline to be blended with 10 percent ethanol if the biofuel is cheaper than regular gas.
Corn farmers defend the four-month old mandate as “one of the greatest Missouri economic development bills.” But livestock producers — many of whom voted for it two years ago — argue it’s contributing to a “livestock industry meltdown” by leading to higher feed prices. And they’re lining up to get it repealed.
Rep. Mike Dethrow, a hog marketer from rural southern Missouri who has filed legislation to lift the ethanol mandate, said knowing what he does today about where corn prices have gone, he would not have supported the bill requiring ethanol two years ago.
“It is a piece of the puzzle,” said Dethrow, R-Alton. “The solution is probably the free market. The solution is probably not more government.”
TheCattleSite News Desk
