Raising 'Sugar-Cane': Investigative Report
(Posted October 3, 2011 07:15 am) | Part I
By Les Coleman
BELLE GLADE, FL - A battle being waged in the ethanol industry pits sugar against corn, and it reaches from Florida to the Midwest to Latin America. Florida is at the center of this "energy war," and this investigative report by Les Coleman examines the history, business and political links between sugarcane-based ethanol and ethanol distilled from corn.
The long arm of Florida "big sugar" reaches far
outside the state and across international frontiers.
Flo-Sun, through subsidiaries such as Florida Crystals
and Domino Foods, has milling and refining operations
around the world. The rulers of Flo-Sun are brothers
Pepe and Alfonso Fanjul, based in Palm Beach, whose
father came to the U.S. on the heels of the Cuban
Revolution more than a half-century ago.
The Fanjuls, naturally, have their eye on Latin America.
So do their close friend and neighbor, David Koch, and
his brother, Charles, who head Koch Industries. Their
common goal: the importation of sugarcane-based ethanol.
Brian Jennings, executive vice president of the
Midwest-corn-dominated American Ethanol Association,
says cane ethanol is not domestic and escapes domestic
taxes.
"We don't have any sugarcane members, to my knowledge. A
lot of sugar ethanol that makes its way into the United
States comes through the Caribbean-based initiative,
which does escape the tariff, the secondary tariff."
That's a 54-cent-per-gallon tax break for imported sugar
ethanol. One recent piece of legislation before the U.S.
Senate was an effort to repeal the fuel subsidy for
corn-based ethanol exclusively produced in the U.S. - an
effort backed by "big sugar" and the Koch brothers.
The Kochs are billionaires and are key backers of the
Tea Party movement and its pro-free-market,
small-government ideology. But Jennings says that
preserving the free market may not be what is behind the
Kochs' move into the ethanol business.
"I think it's disturbing that Koch is lobbying to kill
the ethanol tax incentive at the same time the company
owns shares in ethanol. Koch will continue to fight U.S.
ethanol, I'm sure, even though they have ownership
interest. I'm not surprised to hear they are involved in
Brazilian sugar ethanol production, either."
The Kochs' pot of ethanol gold may not be at the end of
some Iowa cornfield rainbow, but in Paranagua, Brazil,
where one of their companies, Koch Fertilizer, has built
a 57,000-cubic-ton warehouse to provide fuel for the
booming Brazilian sugar cane ethanol industry. Koch
Fertilizer is produced offshore, in Trinidad and Tobago,
and Jennings doesn't much like it.
"I'm a little bit jaded when it comes to a company like
Koch. Unfortunately, this type of thing has been
happening for years, when it comes to farmers and
ranchers trying to get a fair price for their product."
Republican Florida Gov. Rick Scott wants to expand South
Florida ports to accommodate sugar ethanol imports.
Florida sugar producers gave Rick Scott $100,000 in his
successful bid for governor.
Part II in the series, Tuesday, will feature an examination of the sugar industry's campaign money trail.
This investigative report was produced with cooperation from The American Independent News Network.