LOWER ASCS CORN PRICES TO AFFECT TEN STATES The Agriculture Department's widening of Louisiana gulf differentials will affect county posted prices for number two yellow corn in ten states, a USDA official said. All counties in Iowa will be affected, as will counties which use the gulf to price corn in Illinois, Indiana, Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, Mississippi, Arkansas, Alabama and Louisiana, said Ron Burgess, Deputy Director of Commodity Operations Division for the USDA. USDA last night notified the grain industry that effective immediately, all gulf differentials used to price interior corn would be widened on a sliding scale basis of four to eight cts, depending on what the differential is. USDA's action was taken to lower excessively high posted county prices for corn caused by high gulf prices. "We've been following this Louisiana gulf situation for a month, and we don't think it's going to get back in line in any nearby time," Burgess said. Burgess said USDA will probably narrow back the gulf differentials when and if Gulf prices recede. "If we're off the mark now because we're too high, wouldn't we be as much off the mark if we're too low?" he said. While forecasting more adjustments if Gulf prices fall, Burgess said no other changes in USDA's price system are being planned right now. "We don't tinker. We don't make changes lightly, and we don't make changes often," he said.