Artificially Sweetened: An Analysis of the United States Sugar Program

By limiting imports of sugar into the United States, the United States Department of Agriculture maintains a price floor for domestic sugar producers that has traditionally been double the price of sugar on the international market. Operating at an annual cost of two billion dollars, the US sugar program has deleterious effects for both US consumers and foreign producers, many of which live in developing countries. By forcing developing countries out of the US market, the US sugar program costs countries in the third world millions of dollars each year in lost trade and development opportunities. Although agricultural trade liberalization is politically unpopular in the United States, there is still potential to reform this inefficient and unfair trade policy.