Black Snow

Just another reason that the US needs to stop subsidizing sugar. Beyond reason why we subsidize sugar to drive up sugar costs in the US when the land used for sugar cane is polluting our waterways and ash and smoke from burning the fields is killing people and land used for beets could be allocated to other crops.

A Fire in the River: Big Sugar and ‘Black Snow' in the Everglades (msn.com)

Compounding the story, the industry's foothold in the center of the historic Everglades that begins north of Lake Okeechobee and stretches south to the Gulf of Mexico makes it a principal impediment to Everglades restoration. Water that once flowed south from the lake through the Everglades and into the Gulf was diverted into thousands of canals to dry the land for farming. In turn, the effort not only remade the Everglades but remade ways of life for the Seminole and Miccosukee tribes who have lived there for centuries. It irrevocably altered the landscape to suit the agricultural interests and, in some cases, what's become colloquially known as "Big Sugar," a consortium of two companies and a farmer's cooperative.

Today, Florida's sugar growers generate $3.4 billion annually, with more than 14,000 jobs in the state, according to the University of Florida. In just a century, it's grown from a nascent crop into a peerless one.
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If there was any thread of solidarity in the Glades, based upon dozens of interviews, it's that many residents suffer from respiratory illnesses, some turning to a nebulizer three times every day. Many believe that the smoke either caused or exacerbated their symptoms. U.S. Sugar began publishing an annual "State of Our Air" report in 2020, dispelling the connection between the smoke and residents' health. And when we asked the company, it pointed to county-health rankings for air quality as well as a 2013 study by the Florida Department of Health regarding asthma. According to the company, the air was some of the "best … in the state," and met all ambient air-quality standards.

In Pahokee, Jones felt there was nothing to show for a hundred years of growing cane, only a moribund town where most residents drove 40 minutes to shop at Walmarts in Clewiston, West Palm Beach, or Okeechobee. "We don't have nothing, nothing for the kids aside from football and baseball," he said. "That's what hurts me about Madison being raised in this area," Debra added of their granddaughter. "There's no telling how many people around here got breathing conditions," Debra said. "But they never complain, because they need to work." And then softly, she said, "This is an agricultural town. I have to look at it this way: If they close the sugar mills, a lot of people will have no income."

 

but the political contributions are massive. the sugar lobby is strong. history lesson, sugar paid scientists to blame health problems on fat in food and not sugar a long time ago.

Sugar subsidies cost the US between $3B and $4B annually while polluting our air and water and using land that could produce other food to help reduce the price of the alternative crops

The sugar lobby’s up to its old tricks again | The Hill

For years, as a General Accounting Office report that came out this Halloween confirmed, U.S. consumers have been paying $3-$4 billion more annually for their sugar because of the federal sugar program. That amounts to an annual $40 hidden tax on a family of four, caused by a half-century-old farm bill program that on average doubles the price of a four-pound bag of sugar.

This burden is caused by an import and domestic production quota system backed up by a minimum price guarantee that has been in place for almost half a century. For decades, the sugar producers lobby — the Sugar Alliance and its predecessors — has claimed that the program places no burden on taxpayers or federal government spending. The government spending claim is close to being truthful, as import- and domestic-production quotas (coupled with prohibitive tariffs for any non-quota imports) have been extraordinarily effective in increasing U.S. sugar prices. Thus, only infrequently does the federal government have to use taxpayer dollars to buy up sugar at the guaranteed support price.
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The most recent publicly available data on farm numbers, currently for 2017, come from the National Agricultural Census, which is carried out by USDA once every five years. In 2017, a total 627 farms in Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi produced sugar cane and 3496 farms, spread thinly across 11 states planted sugar beets. Thus, only 4,123 of all U.S. farmers — about 0.2 percent of all farms — produced a sugar crop and benefited from the sugar program.
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Sugar Cane Farms Sugar Beet Farms Total
1992 1,031 8,810 9,841
1997 1,079 7,057 8,136
2002 953 5,027 5,980
2007 692 4,022 4,714
2012 666 3,913 4,579
2017 627 3,496 4,123
Source: USDA National Agricultural Statistical Service Agricultural Census

Thus, today, conservatively using the lower end of the range of profits and total revenues from sales accruing to sugar farmers of $1 billion and $3 billion identified by the recent GAO report, the average farm raising sugar cane or sugar beets enjoys higher profits of about $242,000 because of the sugar program. Impacts of the program on revenues from sales are much larger — close to $750,000 a year.

 

good read on how sugar got a local politician elected in the heart of sugar country to go to Tallahassee in 2021 and argue for a law that shields big sugar from being sued for their impacts

How the Sugar Industry Makes Political Friends and Influences Elections — ProPublica

Last year, the Florida Legislature was in the midst of an extraordinary push to protect the state’s farming industry from lawsuits over air pollution.

Supporters argued that the legislation was critical to protecting Florida’s agricultural businesses from “frivolous lawsuits.” But some lawmakers were skeptical, noting that residents of the state’s heartland who were bringing suit against sugar companies would feel their case anything but frivolous. At issue was the practice of cane burning, a harvesting method in which the sugar industry burns crops to rid the plants of their outer leaves. Florida produces more than half of America’s cane sugar and relies heavily on the technique, but residents in the largely Black and Hispanic communities nearby claim the resulting smoke and ash harms their health.
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Now, nine months later, some Democratic lawmakers want to roll back last year’s key changes, which were aimed at barring so-called nuisance lawsuits against farmers. Under the state’s Right to Farm law, certain farming activities are protected from legal action, and the legislation added “particle emissions” to the list. The term is interchangeable with particulate matter, a known byproduct of cane burning and a type of pollution tied to heart and lung disease. Last month, state Rep. Anna Eskamani and state Sen. Gary Farmer introduced legislation to strike that language, hoping to bolster residents’ ability to sue.

It’s a reflection of the views of some Glades residents and environmental groups, who have battled the sugar industry for years over burning crops. They argue that the resulting smoke and ash harms their health — a claim that the sugar companies deny. Last year, The Post and ProPublica deployed their own air monitors to produce a first-of-its-kind investigation into cane burning. The readings showed repeated spikes in pollution on days when the state had authorized cane burning and smoke was projected to blow toward the sensors. These short-term spikes often reached four times the average pollution levels in the area. Experts said the results highlighted a need for more scrutiny from government agencies, which have access to better equipment and data.

 

from 2019

How the sugar lobby paid scientists to point the finger at fat: JAMA (foodnavigator.com)

The US sugar lobby paid for influential research in the 1960s to downplay the link between sugar and coronary heart disease and instead point the finger at fat, according to a report published yesterday.

 

how about we just eliminate tariffs and quit subsidizing sugar and let the free market work. why do we need to socialize sugar production?

 

greening has killed citrus. until that is resolved there is no hope, and citrus has to stay dry. the only thing that makes more pollution than sugar cane is cattle, and they don't like standing in water either. kill the subsidy, that kills sugarcane as it would no longer be profitable, grow bamboo or rice or some other crop that doesn't mind getting wet and doesn't require fertilizer.

 

sugar is endemic to humans. can't make rum without it