One thing I don't understand about the UK decision to give Tate & Lyle Sugars a huge tariff break on cane imports:

Why are pro-Brexit Anglo-Belizeans like Wigmore and Lord Ashcroft spinning it as 'great for Belize'?

This looks *terrible* for Belize. Here's why (thread)

T&L can and does already import raw cane sugar tariff-free from Belize, under EU rules on market access for African, Caribbean and Pacific countries

This gives Belize sugar cane an advantage over massive agricultural economies like Brazil /2

https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2020/08/08/brexit-sugar-cane-tate-lyle-sweetheart-conservative/

Obviously Tate & Lyle didn't back Brexit because it wanted to import tariff-free cane sugar from small countries like Belize (it already does)

It did it because it wants to buy from massive agribiz in places like Brazil, which produce more cheaply /3

http://data.parliament.uk/WrittenEvidence/CommitteeEvidence.svc/EvidenceDocument/International%20Trade/UK%20trade%20options%20beyond%202019/written/44536.html

Equally obviously, small African and Caribbean cane sugar exporters like Belize don't think it's great that Tate & Lyle can now import 260,000 tonnes of raw cane sugar from Brazil to the UK tariff free

They think it's bad /4

https://www.thegrocer.co.uk/fmcg-prices-and-promotions/does-new-uk-tariff-policy-mean-cheaper-sugar/605481.article

Of course, it's not just sugar growers in Belize that stand to get screwed by this

It's also British growers, who now find themselves in direct competition with enormous agribusinesses that intensively use pesticides banned in the UK /5

https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2020/08/08/brexit-sugar-cane-tate-lyle-sweetheart-conservative/

The environment itself stands to suffer. In Brazil cane farmers use enormous amounts of the neonicotinoid thiamethoxam, which is banned from outdoor use here to protect bees, in a country which hosts up to 20% of the world's remaining biodiversity /6

And, oh yeah, just to reiterate *less than a year ago* Brazil's far-right agribiz-friendly president Jair Bolsonaro lifted a 10-year-old ban on sugar cane cultivation in the Amazon rainforest /7 https://news.mongabay.com/2019/11/sugarcane-threatens-amazon-forest-and-world-climate-brazilian-ethanol-is-not-clean-commentary/

And, by the way, for those lazy free-traders saying this will lead to cheaper sugar for UK consumers? No, it won't, if we believe what Tate & Lyle's Gerald Mason told The Grocer magazine /8

https://www.thegrocer.co.uk/fmcg-prices-and-promotions/does-new-uk-tariff-policy-mean-cheaper-sugar/605481.article

As far as I can see, this seems a bad deal for everyone apart from Tate & Lyle(and Brazil/Australia). It's bad for the planet, bad for UK growers, bad for small Caribbean countries

So to finally get back to my *genuine question* why is it being sold as 'good for Belize'? /end