Growing opportunity: Ohio farmers take look at white corn

SALEM, Ohio – Visitors to nearly any grocery store can count on finding a widening shelf space of ethnic food choices, including taco shells, tortillas and corn chips.

Because white corn, a specialty crop used to produce a variety of chips and tortillas, is receiving greater attention in the marketplace, Ohio growers looking for an alternative to yellow feed corn are faced with a growing opportunity.

Information gathered by Morrie Bryant, business leader of food corn for Pioneer Hi-Bred International, indicates the tortilla chip business is growing at a rate of 5 percent a year, largely due to a growing Hispanic population and popularity of Mexican-type food.

“The process used to make tortillas – alkaline cooking – is the same as the one used in Mexico City, the same one the se