U.S. finds new uses for traditional grain

Press, 19 December 1988, Page 34

U.S. finds new uses for traditional grain

NZPA-Reuter Chicago Corn, America’s main grain crop, is gaining importance as researchers develop new uses for the traditional food grain and livestock feed.

The number of products using corn continues to grow, ranging from biodegradable plastics and deicers to new sweeteners and flavour enhancers. The successes of ethanol-blend petrol in the 1970 s and expanded use of high-fructose corn syrup by soft-drink bottlers in the 1980 s are giving way to new chemical products as the corn industry seeks new markets for the 19905. In the vanguard of new corn products is a biodegradable plastic rubbish bag using corn starch as a key ingredient. “Most trash bags are made entirely of polypropylene and they will outlive our grandchildren and our grandchildren’s grandchildren, possibly as long as 400 to 1000 years,” said the ’ National . Corn Growers Association’s market development assistant, Timothy Draeger. “But the exciting thing about the use of corn starch in plastic bags is that there is a direct relationship between the amount of starch in the blend and the speed with which it he said.

Several smaller rubbish bag manufacturers are already using corn starch in their products, although biodegradable plastic bags made with corn starch cost about 10 to 15 per cent more than conventional plastic bags. Mr Draeger said corn can also be used in the foam containers for fast food hamburgers. But the new plastics blend must first be approved for use in food packaging by the Food and Drug Administration. Researchers are also experimenting with genetically developing corn varieties for a specific use — designer corn.

“Corn has been treated primarily as a commodity ... (but) given the natural variability in corn, we can tailor the crop for potential end uses," said an Agrigenetics Corporation researcher, Dr Jane Cramer.

“This is nothing new,” Dr Cramer said, “we’re just tapping resources that are already in the corn plant.”

At American Maize, a corn miller based in Hammond, Indiana, marketing specialist George Reed sees great potential for corn derivatives in photochemicals and agrichemicals or in food flavour enhancers and shelf-life extenders. Researchers at the University- of Illinois are studying a com-based pro-

duct to melt snow and ice on roads in the United States Midwest. The corn de-icer would reduce the body rust that plagues automobiles in states that rely on heavy applications of salt to keep roads clear, said an lowa State University agricultural engineer, Charles Hurburgh.

The direct cost of the new product would be greater because a grown product generally costs more than a mined commodity, Mr Hurburgh said. But he said a noncorrosive de-icer would actually be cheaper when the total cost of rusted cars and trucks was taken into account.

Mr Hurburgh said other promising industrial uses for corn include: • Pesticides blended with a corn starch-based carrier, rather than a petroleum-based carrier.

• Hydrolysing corn gluten to convert insoluble proteins into soluble form for use in high protein food and livestock feed additives.

• Production of sucrose from com for use as a sweetener.

• Butanol-acetone - fermentation, a process that could sharply reduce the cost of producing butanol, as an industrial solvent and fuel additive.