Judd Gregg: “Mr. President, the sugar program as constituted and as it has evolved over the years has regrettably become a raid on…”

“Mr. President, the sugar program as constituted and as it has evolved over the years has regrettably become a raid on the pocketbooks of the American consumer to benefit a small number of sugar producers in this Nation. The price of sugar in the United States is approximately 2 to 2 rac{1}{2} times what the price of sugar is on the world market. The burden of that inflated price is borne by the consumers. In fact, the cost to the consumers is approximately $1.4 billion to $1.8 billion a year depending on whose estimate you use. That inflated price is a function of the fact that we have set up a system of nonrecourse loans, a very arcane system which essentially guarantees to the producer of sugar in this country 18 cents for its cane sugar and 22.99 cents for sugar beet sugar. In comparison with the fact that if they were to grow and try to sell that type of sugar in the open markets, the amount they would actually get would be somewhere in the vicinity of 9 cents. The effect is that the U.S. consumer is paying the difference between 9 cents, which is what the world price is, and 22 cents for sugar.”