You may incorporate corn into your daily life, whether this is in the form of a corn on the cob barbeque side dish or in the form of popcorn, a popular cinema snack. Whatever first springs to mind when you think of corn, it often isn't the thought of corn production and what its social impact is. Read on to find more about this impact and how eating corn can affect others.
What Is Corn?
Firstly, it might be worth clarifying what this product is. Corn, otherwise known as maize, is a cereal grass cultivated for its elongated, large ears of starchy seeds. These seeds are utilized in a range of things such as food for animals and people, useful chemicals, and a biofuel source. As the principal energy source in livestock feed, corn is incredibly useful in our world and is heavily present in food products. Its presence in starch, corn oil, sweeteners, beverages, and even fuel ethanol makes corn exceptionally valuable to our society.
The Social Impact Of Corn
Let's first take a look at how corn can benefit our society.
A Valuable Source Of Food
Corn is the main feed grain in the US, with millions of acres of land being utilized to cultivate it. Therefore, it is clear how vital corn is in livestock feed. This is vital to feed and raise livestock, allowing the food chain to grow and providing more food for humans to consume in the long run.
Trade Benefits
Furthermore, another benefit of corn is that it enhances trade across the world. Corn is one of the most traded commodities concerning agriculture, second to wheat. This can boost employment as well as the economies of different countries.
However, we certainly need to consider the negative social impact which corn production can bring to our planet.
Air Pollution's Risk On Human Health
As the biggest agricultural crop in places such as the US, corn production comes with huge amounts of air pollution. Taking over millions of acres of land certainly puts pollution into effect. Practices within agriculture can contribute vast amounts of human-caused air pollution. This includes the running of tractors, cultivation of land, and production of fertilizer.
Whilst this problem is an environmental impact of corn, it also plays into the social side of things due to the health issues that this can trigger. Air pollution is linked to respiratory illnesses, diabetes, cardiovascular issues, and even birth defects. Human health in this area is, thus, a huge concern, especially since people's lives could be at risk. Suffers of severe asthma could face real problems where air pollution is concerned.
Applying Fertilizer
The ammonia within fertilizer application could also cause human deaths. Fertilizer's nitrogen aids plant growth, but not all of it is actually used by the crop. The excess nitrogen can be washed away into waterways or released into our atmosphere. This heavily contributes to the problem of air pollution and negative health impacts facilitated by corn production. Diseases and other health problems caused by this issue could have devastating economic costs to governments, societies, and even individual people.
Other Impacts
The agrochemicals produced from harmful fertilizer chemicals as well as the fossil fuel energy used in corn production result in other negative impacts such as eutrophication, carbon emissions, land degradation, reduction of freshwater resources, and a depletion of biodiversity. Again, these issues are environmental on the surface, but they also link to social aspects. For example, a lack of freshwater resources could lead to a lack of access to safe drinking water as well as prompting deadly water-borne diseases. As a second example, the lack of biodiversity could lead to less nutritious food resources and fewer medical ingredients, which link to human health.
What Can We Learn From This?
Action is needed to improve the future of corn production. Strategic and beneficial innovations could include reducing fertilizer usage, modifying the areas where corn is cultivated, and improving nitrogen-use efficiency. These actions could enhance corn production's cost to benefit ratio. On top of this, customers are more likely to buy products from companies that use sustainable and environmentally friendly production processes. Therefore, using a few key tactics to improve corn production's overall impact could work wonders for any business!
Main benefits of corn production as well as the negative social impact of corn production with the risk on human health being the most concerning factor.
You may incorporate corn into your daily life, whether this is in the form of a corn on the cob barbeque side dish or in the form of popcorn, a popular cinema snack. Whatever first springs to mind when you think of corn, it often isn't the thought of corn production and what its social impact is. Read on to find more about this impact and how eating corn can affect others.
You may incorporate corn into your daily life, whether this is in the form of a corn on the cob barbeque side dish or in the form of popcorn, a popular cinema snack. Whatever first springs to mind when you think of corn, it often isn't the thought of corn production and what its social impact is. Read on to find more about this impact and how eating corn can affect others.
What Is Corn?
Firstly, it might be worth clarifying what this product is. Corn, otherwise known as maize, is a cereal grass cultivated for its elongated, large ears of starchy seeds. These seeds are utilized in a range of things such as food for animals and people, useful chemicals, and a biofuel source. As the principal energy source in livestock feed, corn is incredibly useful in our world and is heavily present in food products. Its presence in starch, corn oil, sweeteners, beverages, and even fuel ethanol makes corn exceptionally valuable to our society.
The Social Impact of Corn
Let's first take a look at how corn can benefit our society.
"As the biggest agricultural crop in places such as the US, corn production comes with huge amounts of air pollution."
A Valuable Source of Food
Corn is the main feed grain in the US, with millions of acres of land being utilized to cultivate it. Therefore, it is clear how vital corn is in livestock feed. This is vital to feed and raise livestock, allowing the food chain to grow and providing more food for humans to consume in the long run.
Trade Benefits
Furthermore, another benefit of corn is that it enhances trade across the world. Corn is one of the most traded commodities concerning agriculture, second to wheat. This can boost employment as well as the economies of different countries.
However, we certainly need to consider the negative social impact which corn production can bring to our planet.
Air Pollution's Risk on Human Health
As the biggest agricultural crop in places such as the US, corn production comes with huge amounts of air pollution. Taking over millions of acres of land certainly puts pollution into effect. Practices within agriculture can contribute vast amounts of human-caused air pollution. This includes the running of tractors, cultivation of land, and production of fertilizer.
Whilst this problem is an environmental impact of corn, it also plays into the social side of things due to the health issues that this can trigger. Air pollution is linked to respiratory illnesses, diabetes, cardiovascular issues, and even birth defects. Human health in this area is, thus, a huge concern, especially since people's lives could be at risk. Suffers of severe asthma could face real problems where air pollution is concerned.
Applying Fertilizer
The ammonia within fertilizer application could also cause human deaths. Fertilizer's nitrogen aids plant growth, but not all of it is actually used by the crop. The excess nitrogen can be washed away into waterways or released into our atmosphere. This heavily contributes to the problem of air pollution and negative health impacts facilitated by corn production. Diseases and other health problems caused by this issue could have devastating economic costs to governments, societies, and even individual people.
Other Impacts
The agrochemicals produced from harmful fertilizer chemicals as well as the fossil fuel energy used in corn production result in other negative impacts such as eutrophication, carbon emissions, land degradation, reduction of freshwater resources, and a depletion of biodiversity. Again, these issues are environmental on the surface, but they also link to social aspects. For example, a lack of freshwater resources could lead to a lack of access to safe drinking water as well as prompting deadly water-borne diseases. As a second example, the lack of biodiversity could lead to less nutritious food resources and fewer medical ingredients, which link to human health.
What Can We Learn From This?
Action is needed to improve the future of corn production. Strategic and beneficial innovations could include reducing fertilizer usage, modifying the areas where corn is cultivated, and improving nitrogen-use efficiency. These actions could enhance corn production's cost to benefit ratio. On top of this, customers are more likely to buy products from companies that use sustainable and environmentally friendly production processes. Therefore, using a few key tactics to improve corn production's overall impact could work wonders for any business!
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