Pros And Cons Of Corn In Illinois

Introduction
There are a lot of crops that are in Illinois but few are as beneficial as corn. Corn has a long history in Illinois and has made our economy prosper. Corn has helped the economy prosper in a lot of ways. The main way corn helps our economy is by being a food and being able to be sold anywhere. The next way and most of Americans may not know about it is that corn is used in ethanol. For higher yields of corn farmers and scientists have turned to genetic engineering. Corn has a big impact on Illinois, corn helps our economy as a crop and as a part in ethanol production, and through genetic engineering of corn.
Food
As one should know corn can be eaten by humans. Corn has been feeding humans for a long time. Now that the
Corn has been extremely helpful in helping our environment by being used in ethanol. Ethanol is used as gasoline and is helping our planet by using renewable resources as fuel instead of fossil fuels. One may not know this but one probably has ethanol in one’s gas tank right now, since it is in 95% of public gas pumps in the US. Ethanol is advancing developments in a more eco-friendly fuel. Ethanol is very helpful and the pros outweigh the cons by so much that is why it is so widely used throughout the US. a pro of ethanol is that since it is natural it is not as harmful to the air as regular gasoline would be. A con is that is destroys one’s engine faster but the earth is more important than an engine. The University of Illinois has been working on developing newer and more efficient ways to use ethanol. Ethanol is by no means brand new to society as the first engine that could run off of ethanol was invented in 1826 by Samuel Morey. In 1908 the first car that could use ethanol as a fuel was the Model T Ford invented by Ford Motor Companies. Ethanol is required by law to be in gasoline because it is part of the Clean Air Act(1990), the Alternative Motor Fuels Act(1988), the Energy policy Act(2005),and the Renewable Fuel Standard Program(RFS). Ethanol is widely used and very beneficial to our environment and society. Ethanol is the term for Corn alcohol and that is why corn is involved with
That is why scientists have been working to genetically modify corn so that the bad parts of the DNA are gone and replaced with better DNA. Genetic engineering is the splicing of genes so that the original code or DNA is changed to the modifiers liking. The genetic modification has helped in many ways. One main way it has helped is when corn seeds were planted the seeds were attacked and eaten by bugs. Genetic modification has helped strengthen the outer layer of the shell and has kept the bugs out. Also there were a few years where the corn crops died because of a drought. Then there steamed a whole bunch of new genetic strands of DNA that were drought resistant. This really helped a lot of farmers who were losing thousands of dollars to corn that was dying due to the drought. There are many different types of genetically engineered corn crops. There have to be a lot of DNA strands because scientists need to test them and see which strand works the best. The strand that works the best is sent out into the field to be planted along with the original strand of corn. The original strand of corn has to be planted along with the genetically engineered strand so that bugs don’t adapt to the new strand and destroy it. As of 2014 Illinois is the leading producer of corn. In Illinois agricultural commodities add up to 19 billion dollars, Corn accounts for 54% of that