Chapter Three: The Elevator

One of the many elevators one can find in Iowa.

Cities are not the most common sight in rural Iowa--but grain elevators are. An abundance of hard, genetically modified corn kernels overflow most of them, and it's not rare for them to litter the muddy floors surrounding these elevators. With all the processing they are about to go through, no one gives extra effort into making sure the corn stays clean. The surplus of commodity corn--invented in the 1850s in Chicago--all finds its way to an elevator just like the one Naylor uses. But the interesting thing about the corn is its price, and the government deficiency payments. Federal payments account for approximately 50% of an average Iowan corn farmer's income. It seems foolish with the surplus of corn and the already low prices that farmers would continue to grow corn. But the more they grow, the more they get paid, the lower the price of corn goes and the cycle continues again...
Pollan's hope of following Naylor's corn to his plate turned out to be nearly impossible, how was he supposed to pick out thousands of generic kernels from the millions they were mixed in with at the elevator? Figuring all genetically modified corn is the same, Pollan decided to follow the path that 3/5 of those kernels take: to the American factory farm. "Enter the corn-fed American steer."