{"id":40086,"date":"2018-09-05T08:32:22","date_gmt":"2018-09-05T15:32:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/?p=40086"},"modified":"2018-09-05T08:32:24","modified_gmt":"2018-09-05T15:32:24","slug":"global-sugar-trade-its-complicated","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/global-sugar-trade-its-complicated\/","title":{"rendered":"Global Sugar Trade: It\u2019s Complicated"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

(Chuck Muth, President, Citizen Outreach)<\/em> –\u00a0Critics of the U.S. sugar program of targeted import tariffs and quotas regularly point to lower global sugar prices as compared to the cost of American sugar.\u00a0 But the reality of this simplistic argument is far more complicated \u2013 and isn\u2019t comparing apples to oranges.<\/p>\n

For example, a recent Wall Street Journal article by Julie Wernau notes that Brazilian sugar producers \u201care selling sugar at prices that are now below the cost of production.\u201d<\/p>\n

How can they do that?\u00a0 Government subsidies.<\/p>\n

And when a foreign government is subsidizing sugar production so that its global price is lower than the actual production cost, that\u2019s not free trade.\u00a0 That\u2019s unfair trade.<\/p>\n

Making the situation even more complicated is the fact that foreign government subsidies make sugar farming far more lucrative than it otherwise would be.\u00a0 As such, farmers in other countries are growing far more sugar than they \u2013 or the world \u2013 needs.<\/p>\n

Indeed, Ms. Wernau notes, \u201cthe world\u2019s largest producers of sugar are notching record production.\u201d<\/p>\n

And that glut is further depressing sugar prices\u2026which likely will result in even greater government subsidies\u2026which will add to the current glut and continue to distort the actual market.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, Ms. Wernau argues that the U.S. sugar program \u201ckills jobs among foodmakers, who move to Canada and Mexico where they can buy sugar at relatively free-market prices.\u201d<\/p>\n

First, that\u2019s like arguing that stolen Rolex watches can be bought \u201cat relatively free-market prices.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s simply NOT a free market when a competitor is cheating or stealing.\u00a0 Secondly, arguing that food manufacturers are leaving the U.S. for Canada and Mexico because of the cost of sugar is The Big Lie.<\/p>\n

The truth is that manufacturing jobs have been moving out of the country primarily because of the higher cost of labor \u2013 not to mention the higher cost of taxes, insurance, real estate and regulatory compliance – in the U.S.<\/p>\n

But back to Brazil.\u00a0 Interestingly, the global sugar glut \u2013 caused at least in part by Brazilian government subsidies \u2013 could shrink in the near future thanks to Brazil.<\/p>\n

As Marcelo Teixeira of Reuters noted recently, a growing number of Brazilian farmers are giving up on sugar and instead planting soybeans thanks to Chinese tariffs on U.S. soybeans in response to U.S. tariffs recently slapped on various other Chinese imports.<\/p>\n

Even with sugar subsidies, Brazilian farmers are now finding it far more profitable to grow soybeans and sell them to China instead of growing sugar.\u00a0 Which might eventually alleviate the current sugar glut.<\/p>\n

Indeed, when it comes to the global sugar market\u2026it\u2019s complicated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Chuck Muth, President, Citizen Outreach) –\u00a0Critics of the U.S. sugar program of targeted import tariffs and quotas regularly point to lower global sugar prices as compared to the cost of American sugar.\u00a0 But the reality of this simplistic argument is far more complicated \u2013 and isn\u2019t comparing apples to oranges. For example, a recent Wall […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40087,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[748],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40086"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40086"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40086\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40089,"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40086\/revisions\/40089"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nevadanewsandviews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}