Once again, they are under fire. The new Farm Security Act, or The Farm Bill, plans to change sugar policy for the next ten years. Reps. Dan Miller from Florida and George Miller from California have introduced an amendment to the Farm Bill that will have a negative impact on the sugar economy.

The new farm bill if passed would devastate the economy in South Florida by raising employment rates and lowering revenue produced by sugar farmers. There are five provisions of the amendment. It would reduce the level of government loans by a penny a pound, double forfeiture fees to two cents a pound. It would also prevent the U.S. secretary of agriculture from imposing marketing limitations on domestically produced sugar. The Miller-Miller amendment would also earmark 300 million dollars for Everglades restoration that would come from anticipated savings resulting from reducing th

The Miller-Miller amendment will also would reduce the price-floor for sugar from 18 cents a pound to 17. Some marginal U.S. producers will drip out, reducing some sugar production. Since 1996, a total of 17 sugar mills have closed in the United States, including Talisman Sugar in Southwestern Palm Beach County who went bankrupt a couple years back. Because the price of sugar is so low now, last year sugar farmers had to default on their loans causing the U.S. government to buy an estimated 430 million dollars of sugar.

The first was a farm bill should keep a safety net under food producers, without misleading farmers into over producing crops that are already in over supply, by increasing loan rates. Also, from an economic standpoint, increasing loan rates misdirects farmers into basing their planting decisions on government supported loan rates rather than on market demand for particular crops.

One provision of the farm bill that the sugar industry is pushing for is a concept called "inventory management." This would allow the Department of Agriculture to set limits on how much sugar is sold, which would discourage over production.

The U.S. needs a change in sugar policy. The new Farm Bill must find a solution to prevent subsidized Mexican sugar from depressing U.S. markets in the next few years, and from swamping the U.S. market in 2008, when the NAFTA calls for a U.S.-Mexican common market in sugar. Loss of U.S. sugar policy would leave bot

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 988
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)