Growing your next tortilla: Southwest Iowa farmer grows white corn for specialty markets

Drive down the dusty gravel road, and Justin Dammann’s cornfield in southwest Iowa looks like all the fields surrounding it. The lanky corn stalks have turned golden in the late-summer sun, a tell-tale sign that the harvest season is near.
 
Only after Dammann peels back the husk from a cob can you see what makes his corn so unique. The kernels are pearly white in­­stead of a sunny yellow.  

Dammann, a young farmer from Essex, says when he harvests the white corn at night, the kernels seem to glow in the moonlight against the black sky.   Most Iowa farmers plant what’s known as No. 2 yellow corn, but Dammann also grows food-grade white corn, as do many other farmers in southwest Iowa.  
A corn mill in nearby Red Oak processes the Iowa-grown white corn to make tortillas, corn chips and other foods for families in Mexico and across the United States.  

Dammann says Iowa agriculture is a lot more diverse than most people realize.   “It’s not just corn and soybeans ...,” says Dammann, a Page County Farm Bureau member. “It’s much more complex than that, and we (farmers) diversify ourselves and raise different products ... to limit our risk in the market.”
 
In addition to the food-grade white corn, Dammann grows high-amylose corn, another specialty crop for consumer markets.   High-amylose corn ends up as an ingredient in cake icings. It also is used to make eco-friendly corn-fiber carpets, which are a popular home-decorating trend right now.
 
“I’m going to plant whatever (our customers) want,” Dammann ex­­plains.   Yet Dammann also says he likes the challenge of growing specialty crops, which often require a different management strategy than growing regular field corn.   “I get bored,” Dammann says with a laugh. “I don’t like to do what everyone else is doing. I like growing the premium products. It’s fun to raise products that people want.” 

This year, the biggest challenge for Iowa corn growers was the summer drought, which drastically cut crop yields.   However, Dammann says white corn has a better tolerance for hot weather, so he expects to harvest an average-size crop.
 
“What we like about the white corn in southern Iowa is it’s bred in the South, so it’s kind of a Sub-Tropic plant. It handles the heat well ...,” Dammann says.   “But we still have to remember that (the crops) need water, and we kind of missed out on that. So (the corn) suffered without a doubt, but it handled the heat quite well and pollinated well,” he adds.
 
Despite this season’s harsh growing weather, Dammann says farmers are already making decisions about what they will plant next year based on what consumers are demanding – whether it’s tortillas, corn carpets or something entirely new.   “U.S. farmers are going to go out and plant a bigger and better crop next year ..., so this isn’t a long-term problem,” Dammann says. “We will produce enough to fill the pipeline as soon as Mother Nature gives us the water that we need to get it done. The market will tell us that it demands more, and United States farmers will deliver.”