Tortilla Blues

This gave the industry a big opening to explain the institutional barriers to growing niche crops.

Enter Lynn Clarkson, president of Clarkson Grain in Cerro Gordo, Ill. Clarkson, who contracts with farmers to supply organic blue, white and yellow corn and soybeans to companies worldwide, gave the subcommittee an earful.

The name problem, he said, "disadvantages these farmers and their participation in any government program." He said growers aren't asking for subsidies; they want access to USDA programs that would help them manage their finances and get the best prices for their harvest. This would allow them to plant more acreage, he said.

He recounted the story of a Nebraska blue-corn farmer who went to his local USDA Commodity Credit Corp. office to apply for a low-interest, nine-month loan against his harvest. Clarkson said he was told he didn't qualify because he wasn't growing corn.

Clarkson tried last year to correct the definitional inequity within the agency. Now, he's trying to reach Congress through its stomach.

He asked subcommittee Chairman Dennis Cardoza, a Democrat who represents an agricultural district in California, if he has tried blue-corn chips. Then he asked him if he knew they weren't corn.

That got a response: Cardoza said he hoped it could be addressed in the context of the 2007 farm legislation.

Blue-corn growers perhaps should look to the popcorn people, who overcame the same dilemma.

In 2002, the Chicago-based Popcorn Institute, which represents 33 popcorn processors, addressed the problem by lobbying members of Congress.

"If it wasn't corrected, we were limiting the industry's ability to grow," said Deirdre Flynn, executive director of the Popcorn Institute. There were 140,748 acres of popcorn planted in 2006, seven times the amount of blue-corn fields.

In 2003, the fix appeared in a funding bill, conferring on domestic popcorn growers the magic moniker: Corn. Real corn.

Cindy Skrzycki is a regulatory columnist for Bloomberg News. She can be reached atcskrzycki@bloomberg.net.