Starting in October, the fields in Florida’s main sugar producing region, a region known as the Glades, will be on fire. Every year, farmers in this region burn their sugarcane fields in order to remove excess leaves on sugarcane plants, which makes harvesting easier. Sugarcane growers have burned more than 1.5 million acres (2 million hectares) of sugarcane between 2008 and 2018 in the area south of Lake Okeechobee. To put that into perspective, that is a land area about the size of Delaware.
That level of burning has serious consequences on the health of people living in that region. Multiple studies have shown that sugar cane burning releases significant levels of toxic pollution which can cause cardiovascular disease, cancer, and respiratory illnesses. These effects are well known to doctors, who are witnesses to the significant increases in hospitalizations for respiratory issues that occur around the time that sugarcane is burned.
The worst effects of sugarcane burning are disproportionately felt by communities that are already the most marginalized in our society, those of low income and of color. A December 2021 investigation by the Palm Beach Post and ProPublica, found that the practice of burning sugarcane “...sends smoke and ash into largely low-income communities of color in the state’s heartland”. The state government’s monitoring of that air pollution is also woefully inadequate. The Propublica investigation found that the current government relies on a “threadbare air-monitoring system”.
Releasing clouds of smoke and toxic waste into the air affects more than just people’s immediate health. Not only does the smoke and ash harm plants and animals and contaminate water, it is also contributing to global climate change. Every hectare of sugarcane burned releases 1.21 tons of the potent greenhouse gas CO2 into the atmosphere.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. Several other countries have turned away from the harmful practice of burning sugarcane fields. Brazil, the country with the greatest sugarcane production in the world, phased out the practice and switched to a system in which the leaves on the sugarcane plant are repurposed into things like mulch and bioplastics, creating a massive market in Brazil for leftover leaves and the products made from them. Unfortunately, Florida is lagging far behind the rest of the world when it comes to making the switch to more environmentally friendly options.
One particular government department has a lot of power to tackle this issue: Florida’s Department of Agriculture. Unfortunately, the department has been slow and hesitant to act on this issue. But that may finally be changing. A candidate has entered the Democratic primary for Agriculture Commissioner in Florida who is promising to help phase out burning practices and end discriminatory permitting. That candidate is J.R. Gaillot.
The Agriculture Department has the majority of control over open burn permits and regulating open burning within Florida. J.R. Gaillot has said that if he wins this november and becomes Agriculture Commissioner of Florida he will use that power to “encourage production methods that implement green mulching and biochar techniques”, designate sugarcane burning as a “form of negligence”, and limit open burn permits.
His website is very clear about where he stands on the issue, stating that “the burning of sugar cane is unsafe, discriminatory, and extremely harmful to the environment.”
His position stands in contrast with some of his opponents. Wilton Simpson, the man favored to be the Republican nominee for Agriculture Commissioner, heavily promoted a bill while serving in the Florida Senate (SB 88) which made it much easier for the sugar industry to pollute and avoid lawsuits. Simpson has also received an astonishing amount of money from the sugar industry. The Tampa Bay Times found more than $680,000 in lobbying from the sugar industry, the year that Simpson supported the bill, tracing back to a committee he chaired.
Should J.R. Gaillot win the Democratic nomination, Floridians will be faced with a clear choice over the direction of Florida’s sugar industry.