U.S. Sugar Provides Backpacks and School Supplies to Thousands of South Florida Schoolchildren

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Pencils. Glue. Scissors. Notebooks. Each item packed carefully into a backpack by a volunteer.

Thanks in part to U.S. Sugar, thousands of students in Florida started school in August 2019 with brand-new backpacks filled with the supplies they would need for a successful year.

U.S. Sugar partnered with several community organizations, including the Clewiston Library, the City of South Bay, the Palm Beach and Hendry County Education Foundations and the Palm Beach and Hendry County Sheriff’s Departments to provide more than $110,000 in backpacks and school supplies to elementary school students in the Glades farming communities.

Approximately 70 percent of schools in Palm Beach and Hendry Counties are designated as Title 1 schools, meaning they serve a high percentage of students from low-income families.

These Glades communities are vitally important to U.S. Sugar. The Glades communities in western Palm Beach County are agricultural towns that many sugarcane farmers and workers call home, while U.S. Sugar is headquartered in Clewiston, in Hendry County.

Investments in education through projects like U.S. Sugar’s backpack initiative to provide school supplies to help the next generation be successful will help sustain their local communities.

Brannan Thomas, U.S. Sugar’s Community Relations Manager and a native of Belle Glade, helped lead this project and was proud to give back to the community where he went to school.

“U.S. Sugar is proud to donate filled backpacks to our students and help support the important work our teachers are doing to educate the next generation of Floridians,” Thomas said. “Our families live, work, and play in these communities, which means that our success is intrinsically tied to their prosperity.”

Thomas and other U.S. Sugar employees were able to deliver hundreds of backpacks to children at the Clewiston Library and South Bay City Hall as well as to school leaders at Eastside and Westside Elementary Schools in Clewiston.

According to the Florida Department of Education, during the 2018-2019 school year, 100 percent of students at each of these schools qualified for free or reduced-price lunches.

National surveys place the cost of buying school supplies at an average cost of more than $100.

“Notebooks and pencils are necessities for any back to school list, and every student deserves to have access to the supplies they need to succeed in the classroom,” Thomas said.

Pencils. Glue. Scissors. Notebooks. These are more than just supplies checked off a list.

They’re tools that will help secure valuable education opportunities for thousands of children in South Florida.

Minnesota Farmers Leading Phosphorous Fight

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Phosphorus is a naturally-occurring nutrient that is essential for plant life. But, it can be bad for our waterways by causing algal blooms which results in depleted oxygen in the water, which in turn harms plants and wildlife and can disrupt the ecosystem.

Maintaining clean and healthy waterways is a top priority for the sugar industry, which is why the farmers of the Southern Minnesota Beet Sugar Cooperative (SMBSC) have taken action to help stamp out the effects of phosphorus.

And their efforts have garnered praise from conservationists and regulators alike.

In 1999, the SMBSC looked to increase the production capabilities of their factory in Renville, Minnesota, approximately 100 miles west of Minneapolis. Because sugar beets are approximately 75 percent water, processing more than 2 million tons of sugar beets a season requires the successful management of more than a million gallons of water a day. A new wastewater treatment plant was necessary.

In an effort to minimize phosphorus levels in the Minnesota River Basin, SMBSC worked in conjunction with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency during the permitting process to develop a plan to offset potential discharges from their wastewater treatment plant.

For every pound of possible phosphorus released, SMBSC would ensure that 2.6 pounds of nonpoint source pollution does not enter the waterways.

Unlike point source pollution, where contaminants enter the water at an identifiable point such as a factory, nonpoint source pollution occurs when rain runoff or drainage sweeps pollutants into water sources.

This type of pollution is responsible for most of the excess phosphorus found in Minnesota waterways. In fact, a 2004 study prepared for the Minnesota State Legislature found that “nonpoint sources of phosphorus account for 69 percent of the phosphorus entering Minnesota surface waters.” And of that amount, an estimated 25 percent of phosphorus came from cropland runoff.

“As farmers, we have a sincere respect for the resources that have been gifted to us,” says Kyle Petersen, chairman of the board for SMBSC. “We are committed to preserving a sustainable and healthy natural environment and knew that we had to take action to defend our waterways.”

As part of that commitment, SMBSC created incentives for farmers and cattle ranchers to reduce phosphorus pollution from nonpoint sources.

SMBSC worked with their more than 500 farmer shareholders to encourage the use of cover crops to minimize soil erosion caused by wind or rainfall and greatly reduce cropland runoff.

More than 75 percent of SMBSC growers now use a cover crop on their sugar beet fields. Not only are they taking strides to protect the environment, but SMBSC growers have found that cover crops protect the emerging beet plants and improve soil health, leading to an increased yield.

The cooperative has also worked with a local cattle company to stabilize a streambank and put into place measures to restrict cattle from entering the water and reduce pollution.

Not content to simply meet their goals, SMBSC has remained well below the phosphorus release limit established by their permit while exceeding their stated phosphorus reduction commitment.

SMBSC has been credited with preventing more than twice as much phosphorus from entering Minnesota surface waters as required by their permit. In total, that’s a reduction of more than 219,000 pounds of phosphorus.

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency estimates that between 2000 and 2014, Minnesota reduced phosphorus in the Mississippi River Basin by 33 percent, with 8 percent being attributed to cropland best management practices.

We are proud to be leading the fight against nutrient pollution in the Minnesota River Basin,” says Steven Domm, President and CEO of SMBSC. “We work and live in this community and realize that preserving it for future generations is a shared responsibility.

These efforts have rightly won accolades from environmental groups and have been highlighted as an example of best practices for other facilities to follow.

Clean Up the River Environment (CURE) – a Minnesota non-profit dedicated to protecting the Upper Minnesota River Watershed – awarded SMBSC with CURE’s first “good business award” for their work in reducing pollutants. And the USDA Office of the Chief Economist has highlighted SMBSC’s efforts in a “Farm of the Future” profile.

SMBSC continues to be on the forefront of sustainable nutrient management practices. Through their work to raise awareness of the issues surrounding phosphorus pollution, their efforts to maintain healthy waterways will continue to have big impacts in Minnesota and beyond.

Visit SugarSustainably.org to learn more about how sugar farmers and workers are producing sugar sustainably.