Unearthed today: Sweetheart deal
Morning! Just a quick one today.
We’re writing about… Brexit, Sugar cane tariffs, and climate change
A Conservative donor that was one of the only large UK businesses publicly to back leaving the European Union will get a tariff break worth up to £73m next year in one of the government’s first post-Brexit trade reforms, an Unearthed investigation has found.
Tate & Lyle Sugars (T&L) stands to be the sole beneficiary of a government decision to allow tariff-free imports of up to 260,000 tonnes of raw cane sugar next year, when the UK’s post-Brexit ‘transition’ arrangements with the EU come to an end.
The US-owned company’s refinery in Silvertown, East London, is the country’s only importer of raw cane sugar – the UK’s other sugar producers use sugarbeet, grown domestically or in the EU.
The government move has provoked fury from British farmers, who say it is “offshoring legitimate environmental concerns” by forcing them to compete with sugarcane grown to lower environmental standards than the UK’s.
T&L aims to increase imports from major cane producers like Brazil and Australia, which allow intensive use of hazardous and bee-killing pesticides for sugar-cane cultivation that are banned in the UK. Brazil last year cancelled a 10-year-old ban on sugarcane growing in the Amazon rainforest and Pantanal wetlands in Brazil.
Mongabey recently reported that sugarcane expansion into these two ecologically sensitive biomes will generate unprecedented impacts — including deforestation and carbon emissions adding to climate change.
The trade reform comes after years of aggressive campaigning by T&L for a Brexit that removes import tariffs on sugarcane. Unearthed found the company met with government ministers to discuss trade policy and Brexit at least 10 times between 2017 and mid-2019, and sponsored the lanyards at the 2017 Conservative Party conference. That sponsorship was recorded by the Electoral Commission as a donation of £8,287.
The company claims it will only use accredited high-standard suppliers and that the post-Brexit zero tariff quota will merely allow it to import sugar from regions where the cost is currently prohibitive rather than saving it money. However – to my read – the amount of sugar cane which can be imported tariff free under the new arrangement is greater than it was in the EU and more of it can come from countries where sugar cane is produced more cheaply – such as Brazil. As for suppliers; for a commoditized product such as cane sugar
We don’t have much to go on right now but if this early tariff agreement is representative of those in future then concerns around biodiversity and climate change don’t look like they are going to play a major part in the UK’s post-Brexit trading framework.
Read the full investigaton by Lawrence Carter and Crispin Dowler here.
I’m reading about… heat
For years we didn’t talk much about heat and how it effects people. Despite the fact that it was called “global warming” the warming aspect of climate change was largely a non-issue except in the impact it had in melting ice and pushing up sea levels, or changing weather patterns. In hindsight that was very strange and – in it’s way – revealing. Because heat mostly impacts on people who are are not white or rich.
This is the topic tackled by Somini Sengupta in the New York Times. A hotter planet, she notes, does not hurt equally. “If you’re poor and marginalized, you’re likely to be much more vulnerable to extreme heat. You might be unable to afford an air-conditioner, and you might not even have electricity when you need it. You may have no choice but to work outdoors under a sun so blistering that first your knees feel weak and then delirium sets in. Or the heat might bring a drought so punishing that, no matter how hard you work under the sun, your corn withers and your children turn to you in hunger.”
This, she reports, is not, like rising sea-levels swamping major cities, some future risk, it is impacting millions right now. She reports from communities around the world all of whom are struggling with the rising heat, but also many other dangers – some linked to the extraction of fossil fuels, all a result of their marginalisation. None of whom have contributed significantly to climate change.
“Inequality exacerbates climate and environmental risks,” said Kizzy Charles-Guzman, a deputy director for resilience efforts in the New York City Mayor’s office. Heat fuels isolation, which makes the impacts worse. “With no one to check in on you, even a mild case of dehydration can take a quick turn for the worse if you’re frail or suffer from other ailments, like heart disease.”
It’s well worth your time.
Five things you need to know
Global deforestation accelerates during pandemic: Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, forest loss alerts have increased by 77 per cent compared to the average from 2017-2019, according to data from Global Land Analysis and Discovery (GLAD) — a worldwide warning system for the depletion of tree cover — and compiled by conservation body WWF Germany, the FT reports.
on that topic….
India plans to fell ancient forest to create 40 new coalfields: Under a new “self-reliant India” plan by the prime minister, Narendra Modi, to boost the economy post-Covid-19 and reduce costly imports, 40 new coalfields in some of India’s most ecologically sensitive forests are to be opened up for commercial mining, The Guardian reports.
BP’s green energy targets will be tough to meet: BP will need to invest tens of billions of dollars over the next decade and may have to accept lower returns than it can get from oil if it is to meet its target of becoming one of the world’s largest renewable power generators, Reuters reports. The analysis is notable because it suggests BP will have to spend almost all it’s planned investment in “low carbon” on renewable generation to hit it’s target, leaving nothing much for Hydrogen, CCS etc.
on which note…
Big oil remembers ‘friend’ Trump with millions in campaign funds: Donations to support the president’s re-election have flooded in from a fossil fuel industry that has enjoyed three years of energy deregulation and tax cuts.