These can be made into useful by-products. The oil can be used as cooking oil, or as an ingredient in mayonnaise, salad dressing, cosmetics, soaps, plastics and many other products we use every day. The meal from the cottonseed can be used for livestock feed, fertilizer and fish bait. The hulls can also be used as an ingredient in livestock feed, plastics, and synthetic rubber. Linters , which are the short hairs that cling to the seed after the longer fibers have been removed, go into everything from photographic film and paper currency, to cellulose products used in ice cream, chewing gum and maple syrup.
Many useful items come from corn, soybeans and other plants grown by farmers.
Besides the obvious corn products like corn chips, corn meal and cereal, many other items we use every day are derived from by-products of corn. Most processed foods and beverages such as soda water are sweetened, not with sugar, but with corn syrup. Corn oil is used extensively for cooking oil and in margarine, soup, potato chips and other processed foods. Corn starch is used in aspirin, antibiotics, chewing gum, cosmetics and many bakery products. Corn can also be turned into a fuel called ethanol which can be used to power automobiles.