Soybeans... The Miracle Crop

The soybean (Glycine max) is often called the miracle crop. It is the world's foremost provider of protein and oil. The bushy, green soybean plant is a legume related to clover, peas and alfalfa. Farmers plant soybeans in the late spring. During the summer, soybeans flower and produce 60-80 pods, each holding three pea-sized beans. In the early fall, farmers harvest their crop for these beans which are high in protein and oil. A 60-pound bushel of soybeans yields about 48 pounds of protein-rich meal and 11 pounds of oil.

More soybeans are grown in the United States than in any other country in the world. In 2004, U.S. soybean farmers harvested 3.141 billion bushels (85.49 million metric tons) of soybeans. Nearly half the total value of the U.S. soybean crop was exported as whole soybeans, soybean meal and soybean oil.

As early as 5,000 years ago, farmers in China grew soybeans.

In 1804, a Yankee clipper ship brought soybeans to the U.S. When leaving China, sailors loaded the ship with soybeans as inexpensive ballast. When they arrived in the U.S. they dumped the soybeans to make room for cargo.

In 1829, U.S. farmers first grew soybeans. They raised a variety for soy sauce. During the Civil War, soldiers used soybeans as "coffee berries" to brew "coffee" when real coffee was scarce. In the late 1800s significant numbers of farmers began to grow soybeans as forage for cattle.

In 1904, at the Tuskegee Institute in Tuskegee, Alabama, George Washington Carver began studying the soybean. His discoveries changed the way people thought about the soybean; no longer was it just a forage crop. Now its beans provided valuable protein and oil.

By 1929, U.S. soybean production had grown to 9 million bushels. That year, soybean pioneer William J. "Bill" Morse left on a two-year odyssey to China during which he gathered more than 10,000 soybean varieties for U.S. researchers to study. Some of these varieties laid the foundation for the rapid ascension of the U.S. as the world leader in soybean production.

Prior to World War II, the United States imported 40 percent of its edible fats and oil. At the advent of the war, this oil supply was cut. Processors turned to soybean oil.

By 1940, the U.S. soybean crop had grown to 78 million bushels harvested on 5 million acres, and the United States was a net exporter of soybeans and soybean products. That year, Henry Ford took an ax to a car trunk made with soybean plastic to demonstrate its durability. The publicity increased the soybean's popularity.

In the early '50s soybean meal became available as a low-cost, high protein feed ingredient, triggering an explosion in U.S. livestock and poultry production.

The U.S. soybean industry began to look at ways to expand export markets. In 1956, the American Soybean Association (ASA) began to promote U.S. soybeans in Japan. Today, ASA promotes U.S. soybean and product exports in more than 100 countries around the world.