Corn is in Everything

I rewatched the section of Food, Inc. on corn because I wanted to learn more about how companies put corn into our food. Most people never give corn products a second thought, but there is a select few who have to. My mom is one of them. When she was little, she could never peel corn or even touch the husks or hairs because she was allergic, but she could eat it without problem. Over the years the allergy has gotten worse and worse, and now one of the only corn products she can handle is high fructose corn syrup. She can’t even let someone have a sip of her drink if they’ve had something with corn. So when I’m home, meals can be lots of fun between my mom’s corn allergy and my tomato allergy.

My sister, my mom, and I--my sister is the only one without a food allergy

The difference between our allergies (aside from the fact that mine is a lot less severe) is that mine is inconvenient but easily avoidable, whereas hers is one of the hardest food allergies to deal with today. Michael Pollan in Food, Inc. reported that about 90% of supermarket products have corn or soybean products, oftentimes both. I knew corn products were in a lot of food, but I had no idea it was in that many. That 90% includes ketchup, cheese, Twinkies, peanut butter, Cheez Its, salad dressing, Coke, jelly, Sweet & Low, syrup, juice, Kool-Aid, charcoal, diapers, Motrin, meat, and many fast food products. Nearly all Tyson chicken products contain modified food starch, which is a starch derived from corn. Corn is also in some antibiotics and steroids (like certain doses of Prednisone).

A huge reason corn is in so many different foods is that it’s so incredibly cheap. According to the documentary, farmers are subsidized by the government to overproduce it, then big companies buy it at under production cost and use it to feed animals or break it down to be put into products as a filler or give it a longer shelf life. Cows and fish are not meant to eat corn, but it’s so cheap that they are being forced to. When cows eat corn, their stomachs don’t digest it very well and E. coli mutates in their stomachs into new strains of the bacteria. When the bacteria mutates in one cow’s stomach, all the other cows in the pen catch it rapidly because the pens are covered in manure—it is common for the cows to stand in up to a foot of manure. With the speed at which infected cows are slaughtered, it’s nearly impossible to keep manure off the meat, which then infects the meat. But this is another problem entirely.

Part of the problem I have with putting corn in so many things (aside from my mom not being able to eat them) is that the big companies are taking advantage of the farmers and the general public just to make more money. They influence the government to subsidize farmers to make so much so they can buy it under cost, modify it, then sell it at a much higher price. Some companies (Mon Santo) modify the seeds and make farmers buy rights to each individual seed. That’s just ridiculous. Mon Santo is also lobbying to make it illegal to use non-GMO seeds, meaning all farmers would have to buy seeds from them at higher prices than other suppliers.

A list of ingredients made from corn from Food, Inc.

Corn may be cheap, but so is cellulose (wood pulp which is put into food as a filler). Cellulose has no nutritional value and cannot even be digested by the human body. Straight corn does have some nutritional value, but I’m guessing when it’s modified to the point that we can’t even call it corn anymore, all the nutritional value is gone. Take a look at the ingredient lists on your food sometime—it will surprise you how many things corn is in. Look for these ingredients, all of which are made from corn: alpha trocopherol, ascorbic acid, calcium stearate, canola oil, citric acid, citrus cloud emulsion, corn starch, di-glycerides, ethel acetate, ethyl lactate, ethylene, fibertol-2, fructose, fumeric acid, high-fructose corn syrup, inositol, maltodextrin, modified food starch, polydextrose, saccharin, sorbic acid, sorbital, sucrose, xanthan gum, xylitol, and zein.