November 2, 2020

Through the last eight months of the Covid pandemic America’s farmers have not missed a beat, continuing to plant and harvest the crops that keep stores shelves and kitchen pantries well-stocked during difficult economic times. Growers are able to do this even while experiencing stresses on their finances and operations not seen in generations.

As restaurants close, tourism comes to a standstill, and Americans are tightening their budgets, the costs of farming continue unabated. Despite the upheavals in the economy, farmers must still meet financial obligations for seed, fertilizer, labor, land leases, storage, distribution, insurance, and equipment maintenance, costs that must be met in good times and bad.

The very last thing our farmers need is to add to their difficulties through unfair trade practices of foreign nations which block our products through tariffs, while threatening our domestic supply of staples through subsidies and attempts to dump their products at below market rates. Growers of corn, soybeans, wheat, and dozens of other commodities require vigilant federal oversight to ensure that America’s farming businesses are not bankrupted by the pandemic of unfair trade practices that define the global agriculture market.

Nowhere, however, do we see such aggressive and predatory practices of our global partners and competitors as through the sugar industry, generally recognized as the most unfair and corrupted commodity trading today. Nations such as Brazil, India, and Thailand  have their eyes set on dominating the U.S. sugar market through billions in subsidies they provide their domestic growers in an effort to undermine prices and put their product on our store shelves.

Current U.S. sugar policy prevents this through a fair and regulated import quota system that not only protects our sugar growers, but U.S. consumers as well. Without a quota system, cheap, subsidized sugar would flood our market, putting our growers out of business, and then leaving our entire food industry at the mercy of foreign supplies and price manipulations, an entirely unacceptable and reckless outcome.

Sadly, we see certain U.S. food manufacturers and the confectionery industry complain that they want more access to this cheap, subsidized sugar so they can save a few pennies on their costs. This would certainly fatten their bottom line without any assurance that consumers would realize any cost savings. To protect both our growers and consumers, legislators are right to maintain our sugar policy that rejects rewarding global subsidies and dumping, until they agree to play fair and play by the rules.

CASE supports free and fair trade, where the best and most efficient growers are rewarded with access to markets based on competition and consumer choice, not predatory and illegal government handouts to prop up overseas farmers. For this reason, we support the Zero-for-Zero legislation championed by conservative lawmakers and a vocal group of pro-consumer, pro-free market advocates in Washington. Under Zero-for-Zero, all nations agree to not only stop subsidizing their domestic sugar industries, but end tariffs and quotas that block free and fair trade.

This legislation would not only fix the corrupt sugar market, but set a strong precedent for how commodity exchange between nations can be conducted freely and fairly, not only to the benefit of the best and most efficient growers worldwide, but to the benefit of consumers who depend upon a strong and steady sugar market for a host of products in which it plays a vital role. Instead of flying the white flag of surrender to predatory trade practices, U.S. consumers and taxpayers should stand firm in demanding a level playing field in global trade, to raise the bar for all nations seeking to strengthen their economy and their domestic markets through competition that benefits us all.

As America and the world work to rebuild our economies torn down by the Covid pandemic, good faith legislation such as Zero-for-Zero will go a long way to not only protecting America’s beleaguered farmers, but our struggling families as well.