Iowa, United States

Iowa – American Heartland

Iowa, a US state in the Midwestern United States is a region which is called the `American Heartland’. It is lined by the Mississippi River towards the east and the Missouri River and the Big Sioux River on the west. Iowa is the only U.S. state which has the eastern and the western borders entirely by rivers where it is bordered by Wisconsin and Illinois to the east, Missouri to the south, South Dakota and Nebraska to the west and Minnesota to the north. Iowa was part of French Louisiana, in colonial days and its current state flag is designed after the flag of France.

After the Louisiana Purchase, the settlers laid the foundation in the heart of the Corn Belt for agriculture based economy. Its agricultural economy in the latter half of the 20th century, expanded to manufacturing, processing, financial service, technology, information, biotechnology together with green energy production. It is the 26thmost extensive land area as well as the 30th most populous of the 50 United States. Iowa has been listed as one of the safest states and its largest city is Des Moines.

Natural Lakes & Manmade Lakes

Iowa is not generally flat and most of the state comprises of rolling hills. It is divided in eight landforms due to the glaciation soils, topography and the river drainage. Along the western border of the state lie the Loess hills, some of which are hundreds of feet thick.

Towards the northeast area along the Mississippi River lies a part of the Driftless Zone with steep hills and valleys which appear to be almost mountainous. Many natural lakes will be found in Iowa like the Spirit Lake, West Okoboji Lake and East Okoboji Lake towards the northwest area of Iowa while to the east is the Clear Lake, Some of the manmade lakes are Lake Odessa, Saylorville Lake, Coralville Lake, Lake Red Rock, Lake MacBride and Rathbun Lake. Towards the northwest area of the state are a considerable number of remnants of the common wetlands like the Barringer Slough.

Foremost State in Farming

Iowa is one of the foremost states in farming in the United States and one fifth of the nation’s corn harvest comes from Iowa. Iowa stands first in the nation in grain harvest. It produces food, clothing, fuel; medicine for the world and agricultures is one of the leading industries, having more than 100,000 farms in the state.

Each Iowa farm family produces enough food and fibre to feed around 279 people where one-fourth of which live overseas. The wet springs together with the warm summers provide an appropriate environment for plantings of corn as well as soybeans in the top grade farmland. Though agriculture is the main economy, Iowa also encourages the growth of manufacturing and service industries.

Iowa leads the country in the production of corn and has also been called the `Land where the Tall Corn grows’ and the nickname pays tribute to Iowa’s corn crop. Iowa has also been referred to as the `Land of the Rolling Prairie’, due to the vast rolling prairies which cover the state.

Its largest source of income comes from manufacturing, followed by services, wholesale or retail trade and government while 24% of America’s pork and 4% of the nations’ grain-fed beef are raised in the state of Iowa.