Corn Sugar, also maize – the only member of the genus corn cultural family of grasses. In addition to cultural maize, Zea genus includes four species – Z. diploperennis, Z. perennis, Z. luxurians, Z. nicaraguensis – and three wild subspecies of Z. mays: ssp. parviglumis, ssp. mexicana and ssp. huehuetenangensis. It is believed that many of these taxa have played a role in the selection of maize culture in ancient Mexico.
Maize was introduced into the culture of 7-12 thousand. Years ago in what is now Mexico. The oldest finds of grains of maize culture in the territory of the modern state of Oaxaca (Cave Nakitts Gwilym) and Puebla (cave near the city of Tehuacan) dated respectively 4250 and 2750 years. BC. e. Interestingly, corn on the cob at the time were about 10 times less than that of modern varieties, and do not exceed 3-4 cm in length.
Producers and consumers
The largest producer and supplier of maize in the world – the United States n, which represent 39% of world production and 55% of world exports of this product. The second highest number of exported maize – Argentina. In second place is for the consumption of China, while Japan – the largest importer, which imports almost twice as much maize soybean and wheat combined. 80% of corn imported from the United States and its price is the highest among all the products imported from the United States.
The increasing use of maize as a raw material for the industry in the US has led to a drop in the level of exports: now it is 55% and in 2007 – 64%. In China consumption increases, especially as animal feed.
In general, the corn used in the three directions – as feed animals, people consume it, and as it is required in the production of ethanol (mainly in the USA). Since 1990, the demand for corn for this purpose in the United States increased from 349 million. Bushels to 5,000 million. Bushels (or 40% of the maize consumed in the US). US Department of Agriculture estimates that by 2015 the ethanol industry maize consumption will increase by another 5.5 billion bushels for the year.
Other raw materials used to produce ethanol – and sugar sorghum. The demand for maize as animal feed has risen as a result of improving living standards. A cattle require a lot of grain: about 7 pounds of feed required for the animal to put on weight 1 pound.
Exchange
In 2010, two of the most stand out in terms of turnover of trade in futures contracts for corn began to commodity exchanges such as the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) and Dalian Commodity Exchange (DCE). Futures contracts for corn are also traded on the Tokyo Grain Exchange (TGE), Kansai Commodity Exchange, Bolsa de Mercadarios & Futuros (BM & F) in Brazil, Budapest Commodity Exchange, Mercado a Termino de Buenos Aires, EURONEXT Paris, the Johannesburg Securities Exchange and also on the Minneapolis Grain Exchange.
