Monday, May 21, 2007

With Corn Prices Rising, Pigs Switch To Fatty Snacks - WSJ.com

With Corn Prices Rising, Pigs Switch To Fatty Snacks - WSJ.com: "Growing demand for corn-based ethanol, a biofuel that has surged in popularity over the past year, has pushed up the price of corn, Mr. Smith's main feed, to near-record levels. Because feed represents farms' biggest single cost in raising animals, farmers are serving them a lot of people food, since it can be cheaper.
[Alfred Smith]

Besides trail mix, pigs and cattle are downing cookies, licorice, cheese curls, candy bars, french fries, frosted wheat cereal and peanut-butter cups. Some farmers mix chocolate powder with cereal and feed it to baby pigs. 'It's kind of like getting Cocoa Puffs,' says David Funderburke, a livestock nutritionist at Cape Fear Consulting in Warsaw, N.C., who helps Mr. Smith and other farmers formulate healthy diets for livestock."