| WASHINGTON - Although national and international events have put a
damper on some Halloween activities here in the U.S. this year, record
amounts of candy and sweetened products will still be purchased-and at a
higher price, even though the price American sugar farmers receive for
their product has plummeted.
Jack Roney, the director of economics for the American Sugar Alliance,
a person who keeps tabs on the government figures that show these sorts of
things, reports that data
from USDA and the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that since 1996 the
wholesale refined sugar price-which is what the farmers get-has dropped
more than 23 percent. At the same time, candy is up 8 percent, cereal is
up 6 percent, cookies and other bakery products are up 11-14 percent, and
ice cream has soared by more than 21 percent.
"What is really disturbing," Roney said, "is that even
the price for sugar on the grocery shelf is up, by 5.8 percent. Grocers
don't add value to the sugar they buy in bags. They just put it on the
shelf. They're buying the sugar from farmers for nearly a fourth less, and
selling it to consumers for 6 percent more."
Roney noted, however, that the consumer
price for sugar in America is still 20 percent below the average of what
consumers in other developed countries pay.
"The scary part of all of this is that these same big commercial
sweetener users who are raising their prices to consumers are the ones who
are attacking U.S. sugar policy, trying to drive even lower the prices
efficient American sugar farmers receive for their hard work," Roney
said.
"Their actions are truly a 'trick' on American consumers and
farmers because none of these lower prices the grocers and manufacturers
pay for sugar are passed on to consumers as a 'treat,'" Roney said. |