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GMA Outlines Principles For Sugar Reform;
Current Program Barrier To U.S.
Trade
WASHINGTON, DC,
August 6, 2001 - The Grocery Manufacturers of
America today outlined guidelines for reforming
the U.S. sugar program before an audience of sugar
growers at the International Sweetener Symposium
in Sun Valley, Idaho. GMA emphasized that reform
must balance the needs of growers, manufacturers
and the trade obligations of the United States.
Those principles, as developed by the Coalition
for Sugar Reform and laid out by GMA Director of
International Trade, Sarah Fogarty, are as
follows:
First, policies should allow the market to
operate in such a manner that supplies are
adequate and balanced. This means that
shorting the market through production controls
should be off the table, and market signals should
be transmitted to all producing regions so that an
imbalance of beet sugar relative to cane sugar can
be avoided.
Second, the U.S. market needs to become more
open to world supplies. In recent years
imports have been cut by as much as 40%. Reversing
this trend is vital to accommodating the current
and future trade obligations of the United States.
Third, policy should not provide incentives
for overproduction. The current support system
encourages more domestic production than the
market demands. The operation and role of the
support price, the loan program, the tariff rate
quota and the forfeiture penalty all need to be
analyzed in this context.
Fourth, market prices must be able to
fluctuate with supply and demand. Price
movements have been the result of abrupt and
arbitrary government policy changes, excess
supplies induced by government programs and
similar factors. A new policy should permit the
price mechanism to operate with greater
market-responsiveness than is the case today. “GMA
believes that the current sugar program has not
met the needs of either producers or
manufacturers,” said Fogarty. “The sugar producers
have constructed an unsustainable short term
approach to a major structural problem. The
program needs real, forward looking reform, not a
short-term backward looking fix.”
“What is needed is a major policy overhaul,
creating a program that meets both domestic and
international market conditions for a true
long-term solution,” added Fogarty. “GMA and the
Coalition for Sugar Reform's principles all have
one overriding theme-that we should give more sway
to market forces than the current policy allows.”
GMA said it will urge Congress to improve the
farm bill, when it comes up for a vote next month,
with an amendment sponsored by Rep. Dan Miller,
R-Fla., and Rep. George Miller, D-Calif. The
Miller-Miller language would create a program
consistent with the principles outlined above and
bring meaningful and significant reform to the
sugar program.
The Coalition for Sugar Reform is a group of 18
organizations and associations whose objective is
achieving market-oriented reform for the U.S.
sugar program. GMA is a steering committee member
of the coalition.
###
GMA is the world's largest association of food,
beverage and consumer product companies. With U.S.
sales of more than $500 billion, GMA members
employ more than 2.5 million workers in all 50
states. The organization applies legal, scientific
and political expertise from its member companies
to vital food, nutrition and public policy issues
affecting the industry. Led by a board of 42 Chief
Executive Officers, GMA speaks for food and
consumer product manufacturers and sales agencies
at the state, federal and international levels on
legislative and regulatory issues. The association
also leads efforts to increase productivity,
efficiency and growth in the food, beverage and
consumer products industry. Staff Contacts
Related GMA Documents dealing
with - SUGAR PROGRAM REFORM
BUZZ
- July
28, 2000 Coalition For Sugar Reform:
Subsidy Program Is "Achilles' Heel" Of Trade
Policy
COMMENT
- August
31, 2000 GMA Comments to U.S.
Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agricultural
Service, Request for Public Comment on
Administration of FY 2001 Sugar Tariff Rate
Quota
CORRESPONDENCE
- March
15, 2002 GMA Letter to Congress
Requests Retention of One Cent Sugar Forfeiture
Penalty
- April
5, 2000 Coalition for Sugar Reform
Letter to USDA Secretary Dan Glickman, Oppose
Surplus Sugar Purchases
NEWS RELEASE
- August
6, 2001 GMA Outlines Principles For
Sugar Reform; Current Program Barrier To U.S.
Trade
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