Big Sugar
Big Sugar is a collective
term for the major sugar farming contenders in the Everglades Agricultural
Area including large operations such as US Sugar Corp, Flo Sun,
and Florida Crystals. Notorious for their environmentally un-friendly
procedures, Big Sugar has become the major polluter of the Everglades
region. Sugar farming and refining produces chemical refuse that
is dumped into water sources making water unsafe for drinking and
affecting the plant and animal life. Their strong lobbying efforts
allow them to do this without having to pay for all of cleaning
and purification. In fact, they leave the majority of that to the
tax payers.
Adding insult to injury, the Federal Sugar Price Support
Program, authorized in 1981 under the U.S. Farm Bill, does very
little to stop the Florida sugar industry from polluting the Everglades.
It does, however, squander tax dollars and authorizes a price-fixing
scheme that is destroying America’s Everglades. The following
facts about the Sugar Price Support Program are alarming and illustrate
the “special treatment” that has been extended to Big
Sugar.
- Allocates 70% of the federal subsidies to
the Sugar Industry although it only makes up less than 1% of the
total U.S. crops.
- Controls the price of sugar (currently three
times the world price) through quotas.
- Guarantees profits for
the Florida sugar industry.
- Costs consumers $2 Billion* a year
in higher food prices.
(Source: U.S. Government Accounting Office
Report)
- Costs consumers and taxpayers $2,805,800,000*
annually.
- Causes inefficiency and overproduction
- Costs
taxpayers $459 Million* for loan default-buy back program (rich
sugar corporations borrow federal money to grow sugar cane and
then default on their loans, forcing the federal government to
buy the over-produced sugar)
- Costs taxpayers $16.8 Million* for
storage of overproduced sugar
- Costs taxpayers $388.1+
Million* to Florida sugar companies in annual benefits and subsidies
from state and federal governments
- When the Sugar Program
was instituted in 1981 there were 23 sugarcane refineries in
the U.S. – today there are 8, and employment
in sugar refineries since 1981 has dropped 57%.
- As many as 26,500
food and beverage manufacturing jobs (such as U.S. candy plants
closing) have been moved overseas since 1997 due to our elected
officials' protection of the Sugar Program.
- The Sugar Program
made the Florida sugar barons some of the richest and largest
corporate welfare receivers in the world allowing them to give
millions of dollars in campaign contributions to politicians to
ensure the Program's continuation.
- In 2002 under the Bush administration
the Sugar Program was increased by as much as $5 Billion for
the next five years.
- The Sugar Program is responsible for the
destruction of as much as 9 acres of America's Everglades every
day.
*In year 2000 dollars
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