US sorghum boom fuelled by drought, China moonshine, hogs
Exports of sorghum from the US are headed for the most in 35 years with most of it going to China
Chicago
ACROSS the Great Plains, farmers are turning to a little-known grain called sorghum for relief from a two-year slump in agriculture prices.
A kernel-yielding stalk that's native to Africa, sorghum has three things going for it right now: it's cheap to plant; it holds up better in drought-like conditions than other crops; and most importantly, demand is soaring in China, where farmers feed the plant to their hog herds, and moonshiners make it into a whiskey-like liquor called baijiu. While corn, soyabeans and wheat slumped into bear markets last year amid a global supply glut, sorghum prices have held stable.
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