High demand for GM corn in USA

Dupont says it will run out of modified corn seed
25.jan.07
Bloomberg via Agnet, Jack Kaskey

A Bloomberg article reveals that DuPont Co. are running out of supplies of the company's most profitable variety of corn seed.

It will sell out this year because rising demand for ethanol in North America has sent crop prices to the highest in a decade.

It cites Erik Fyrwald, DuPont's vice president of agriculture, to report tha the Pioneer seed unit doesn't have enough supply to meet demand for corn engineered with three benefits, including pest and herbicide resistance.

DuPont will have enough seeds to meet demand in 2008 and will halt probably its market-share erosion.

Wilmington, Delaware-based DuPont is struggling to stop Monsanto Co., the world's biggest developer of genetically modified crops, from taking a bigger share of the U.S. corn-seed market for a sixth year. Fyrwald was further cited as saying that about 10 percent of DuPont's domestic supply has been modified to resist herbicide and two types of insects, which isn't enough to meet demand, adding in a conference call with reporters, "North American corn is critically important to us, but we've got a lot of great opportunities around the world."

U.S. farmers are likely devote 10 percent more acres to corn this year, according to Bloombberg.

American Farm Bureau expect another 5 percent increase in 2008. Corn prices have almost doubled in the past year and on Jan. 17 reached $4.21 a bushel in Chicago, the highest since 1996.