Corn’s Essential Role in Producing Meat, Eggs and Cheese

When thinking of corn’s impact on the U.S. food system, it’s easy to picture corn on the cob and products made from corn like corn bread or tortilla chips. However, corn also plays a pivotal role in the production of meat, eggs and cheese.

While you won’t find products that say “made of corn” in the dairy aisle, corn provides crucial nutrition for the livestock that provides milk, eggs and meat. Livestock like poultry, pigs and cattle eat corn or feed containing corn as an ingredient as part of their daily rations due to the high dietary value of corn, said University of Nebraska-Lincoln Professor Galen Erickson.

“It is a great way to provide energy to livestock,” said Erickson, the Nebraska Cattle Industry Professor of Animal Science. “And then those livestock [can] contribute valuable, human-edible protein.”

Not only do many foods come from animals that eat corn, but livestock also eat many different forms of corn. However, all of these corn products contain valuable nutrients that helps livestock grow and supply food to consumers around the world.

How Is Corn Used to Produce Chicken, Pork and Beef?

Long standing as one of the major crops planted in the U.S., field corn is an important part of the production of livestock in Nebraska and around the world. The nutrition helps animals grow healthy and produce high-quality meat for consumers.

Poultry and pigs eat corn in the form of commercially produced livestock feed that contains corn as an ingredient. These feeds, also called rations, are carefully calculated to help these animals grow in an efficient and healthy way, and the energy, carbohydrates and other nutrients provided by corn are a crucial part of the feed.

Beef Cattle

While most beef cattle in Nebraska eat grass for the majority of their lives, they often consume corn and corn-products while being prepared for market. Farmers may feed corn to their cattle by mixing corn kernels in their rations, or through commercially produced livestock feed that contains corn as an ingredient. Beef cattle feed rations also can include two corn-based co-products created during the ethanol-making process — distillers grains and corn gluten meal.

In addition to eating corn while being prepared for market, many cattle graze cornfields after harvest. Corn-based feed products are also used as a nutritional supplement for young or growing calves.

By grazing cornfields, Erickson estimates cattle eat 20%of the cornstalks, leaves, husks, cobs and ears left behind by the combine. Not only does this provide nutrition for the cattle, but he said about 10 percent of what they eat is deposited back in the fields in their manure, which is a natural fertilizer.

Why Is Corn a Beneficial Feed for Cattle?

Feeding corn to beef cattle in the final stages of market preparation can increase the weight of the cattle, tenderness of the beef and marbling of the meat that customers often enjoy. In addition, Erickson said using corn for cattle feed also helps make the U.S. beef industry more efficient than other beef-producing nations.

“Every year, the U.S. produces about 20-25% more beef than, let’s use Brazil as an example, and we have about 50% of the cattle they have in Brazil,” he said. “So, we’re producing more beef annually in the U.S. than Brazil with less than half as many cattle. That’s a huge impact.”

How Is Corn Fed to Dairy Cows and Laying Hens?

Dairy cattle and chickens eat corn in many forms, ranging from the whole corn plants, such as silage to kernels to commercially produced livestock feeds or supplements that contain corn as an ingredient, such as distillers grains.

Dairy Cattle

Dairy cattle need highly nutritious food to produce the milk used to make cheese and other dairy products. A source of much of this nutrition comes from corn silage, which is a mixture of chopped up, fermented corn plants. The plants are harvested while the crop is still green, then chopped up and allowed to ferment. The result is a mixture that provides dairy cattle with valuable energy, fiber and starch. It also provides beneficial protein for the cattle.

Laying Hens

Corn is a component in many commercially produced feed products eaten by chickens that produce eggs, called laying hens. The nutrients in corn support the hens’ overall health and egg-laying capacity, ensuring they have the energy to produce eggs. Chickens also eat whole or cracked corn kernels.

How Is the Role of Corn as Livestock Feed Changing?

Farmers are always seeking new and better ways to utilize corn’s nutritional properties. One of the biggest changes is the increasing use of ethanol byproducts as livestock food. Distillers grains, in particular, are an excellent source of fiber, protein and fat for growing cattle. They are uniquely beneficial to cattle because of the way they are digested, Erickson said.

Nebraska is the second-leading producer of ethanol in the country and home to two dozen ethanol plants, so distillers grains and corn gluten meal are both a readily available and highly nutritious food source for the state’s many beef producers.

“They’re not human-edible, and cattle really do well on them,” Erickson said.

Corn Silage Making a Comeback

Another change Erickson sees is that more beef producers are feeding corn silage. Though it’s most often associated as food for dairy cattle, silage—which Erickson said was commonly fed to beef cattle many years ago — is something more of today’s farmers are using as a cost-effective way to provide energy to their beef cattle.

“It’s an excellent opportunity for all of our beef producers,” he said. “We’re seeing a comeback, if you will, of using more sileage because we think it’s very economical, year-in and year-out.”

Corn: A Cornerstone of the Food System

Because it contributes to so many products found in grocery stores, it’s easy to see why corn is so important to the U.S. food system. It is key in the production of animals for their meat, eggs and milk used to make ice cream, cheese and other dairy products. Corn benefits the food system as efficient livestock feed, while also helping keep the animals healthy!