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Raising biofuel standard top legislative priority for Minnesota Corn Growers

The president of the Minnesota Corn Growers tells Brownfield the top legislative priority for the association is increasing the biofuel standard.

Tim Waibel, a corn and soybean grower from Courtland, says he recently discussed the benefits of higher ethanol blends with his new District representative.

“The proximity of where I live (on) any given morning except a foggy morning I can see the steam from three ethanol plants, and they are big consumers of corn for us. Certainly we can all remember back to where our basis was at before the ethanol industry came into play.”

He says a stronger basis helps strengthen the overall economy.

The Corn Growers would like to see Minnesota raise the biofuel standard from 10 to 15 percent.

“You always have a lot of people who question the food versus fuel and so on and so forth, but we’ve got to remember we still export a huge amount of grain every year. And I for one believe that the more we can use locally, the much better off we are with that grain. And certainly that is the case of the biofuels industry.”

Waibel says other priorities this Session include enacting buffer property tax relief for farmers and protecting tax policy gains from the past several years as Minnesota deals with a state budget hamstrung by the coronavirus pandemic.