From Black Snow to Blue Skies: How a Worker-Led Initiative Can Bring Clean Air to the Everglades Agricultural Area

Introduction

“On the days where they did green harvesting, we were able to play sports . . . we could walk home after school. On the days when they [burned sugarcane], it was bad. It was terrible. It was unbearable.”

Louis Jeune, Resident of the Glades Region (Mairena and Hubbard 2023)

Every year, from October to May, billowing black smoke rises with disturbing frequency in the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA), a sugarcane-producing region in South Florida, located about 40 miles west of Palm Beach in the Miami metropolitan region. The fumes, nicknamed the “Black Snow” by residents, are a result of a pre-harvesting method that involves setting fire to the fields to eliminate the outer leaves of the cane. Removing the outer leaves, also called “trash,” from the stalks is a crucial step in preparing the fields for harvest. The burning, however, has serious health consequences for the over 30,000 people who live in communities where the practice occurs. Harmful levels of particulate matter (PM) are released during the burns, and research ties higher levels of PM to asthma, heart and lung disease, and premature death (Ramadan, Ngu, and Miller 2021).

The human impacts of such high levels of PM are overwhelming and cause a series of negative socioeconomic consequences. During the burning season, it is common for residents to plan their days around the smoke to avoid going outside during scheduled burns. Locals have also developed rituals over time to protect themselves from the ash and soot that fall upon their communities during the winter months. Families keep nebulizers and inhalers at hand. If there is an opening in one of the house’s windows, they press AC filters to stop smoke from coming in. Public schools in the region often cancel outdoor recess when the skies are smoky (Ramadan, Ngu, and Miller 2021). One of the region’s residents, Louis Jeune, recalls the days when all students at Glades High were packed in the cafeteria while the black snow was falling. As an urgent care receptionist, she remembers the patients who would ask for nebulizers in preparation for the burns (Mairena and Hubbard 2023).

Several peer-reviewed scientific articles back up the lived experiences of residents in the region. Studies show a higher incidence of several respiratory conditions connected to the burns among residents of the Glades. A 2022 study conducted by the Florida State University shows that 2.5 annual deaths in South Florida are directly attributable to PM from the burns (Nowell et al. 2022). An additional study by Michée Lachaud from Florida A&M University points to significantly higher asthma cases during the burning season and a 10.8 percent increase in burning-related asthma ER visits and hospitalizations (Lachaud 2024).

Life in Glades doesn’t have to be this way. An alternative to burning, green harvesting, exists and is already in use in several countries such as Brazil, Thailand, and Zimbabwe (Hagens Berman 2020). Green harvesting does not involve the use of controlled fires to clean out the cane’s outer leaves. Instead, it is a method that deploys mechanical harvesters to separate the trash from the stalk, thus performing a crucial pre-harvest activity in a safe and sustainable manner (Florida Bio Processing n.d.). Employing green harvesting in the EAA would ensure that local residents no longer have to deal with the harmful effects of the black smoke and could fully enjoy the benefits of a clean environment.

This brief will suggest proposals to halt the use of burning as a pre-harvesting technique in the EAA, as well as analyze how and why previous attempts at solving the problem have failed. The main proposal consists of the creation of a “Fair Trade” program, similar in scope to existing programs in the US and overseas, although with different goals. Fair Trade schemes are generally a way to ensure that goods have been sustainably produced and that farmers are treated fairly and paid living wages. In other words, programs like these ensure that products, from chocolate to office supplies, have been ethically sourced (Global Citizen 2012). The main goal of a Fair Trade program in the EAA would be to ensure that all farms in the region use green harvesting as a way to clean out the stalks, as opposed to burning. By implementing strict review processes, customers would be assured that any EAA-grown sugar package with a “Fair Food” stamp was produced without the use of burning as a pre-harvesting technique. Such a program would be a significant step toward ensuring that residents of the Glades can finally live a life free of the dangers of the black smoke.

Background and Context

Sugarcane burning in the Glades is an issue that dates back decades. It is hard to pinpoint when exactly the practice began, but there are reports by senior citizens in the region of burning fields as early as 1984 (Adno 2024). Mass production of cane in the region, however, began in the early to mid-20th century after the US government drained a large section of the Everglades and a sizable area south of Lake Okeechobee became arable farmland. A blockade on Cuban sugar instituted in 1960 helped boost domestic cultivation and facilitated the rise of “Big Sugar,” a group of powerful sugar companies that dominate cultivation in Florida (Mitchell 2022). Since then, the EAA has grown to encompass about 400,000 acres of farmland in Palm Beach and Hendry counties, and sugar produced and refined in the region serves as a crucial economic engine for those counties (Stainback 2020).

The economic benefits the sugar industry brings to the region are heavily influenced by the federal sugar subsidy program. The subsidies, which date back to 1981, in many ways mask the real benefits the industry brings to the region and the country. The USDA program artificially props up domestic sugar prices by setting import quotas, limiting marketing allotments, and forcing the government to buy sugar at a loss if the price falls below a predetermined cost as to reduce the amount for human consumption (Stainback 2020). The program generates over $1 billion a year in profit for growers and ensures the industry remains profitable (Smith 2018). While these subsidies are beneficial to “Big Sugar,” they are economically harmful to American consumers. In fact, in the US, sugar usually costs almost twice as much as in the rest of the world. This amounts to American consumers paying an extra $10 a year in sugar (Stainback 2020). The data does not take into account the negative financial impacts of burning practices on local communities, such as lowered real estate value, decreased investment, time off from sick days, etc. In essence, American taxpayers are propping up an industry that conducts extremely harmful harvest methods while reaping negative value from the practice, either in the form of higher sugar prices or worsened air quality.

The federal sugar subsidy program is not the only way that the government played a role in contributing to the problem. More recently, in 2021, the Florida legislature overwhelmingly voted for, and the governor signed, an amended version of the state’s Right-to-Farm Act. These laws were originally intended to protect small farmers from nuisance lawsuits and protect a certain “agricultural way of life.” But in Florida, the amended version was clearly drafted to protect massive sugar operations (Coleman 2022). The law greatly expanded the definition of “nuisance” to prohibit residents from filing almost any lawsuit against sugar companies, including any claims made regarding negligence, trespass, personal injury, etc. (Coleman 2022). The bill also defined that “particle emissions,” a term used interchangeably with particulate matter, is a protected factor in farming operations. Locals are then left with no legal recourse to fight back against the smoke that blankets their communities every winter. Although attempts to reverse the changes have been introduced at the legislature, they have all failed to garner enough support (Florida House of Representatives 2022).

Big Sugar can easily secure these regulatory wins because of massive lobbying expenditures at the state capital, Tallahassee, and federally in Washington, DC. Between 2018 and 2024, the sugar industry spent $36 million on Florida political contributions, and even though sugar amounts to only 2 percent of all US crop value, it represented 40 percent of lobbying spend among all crop industries (Pittman 2025; Smith 2018). Big Sugar’s expenditures all but ensure the continued preferential treatment it receives from all levels of government, thus helping it eschew responsibility from acting sustainably.

In its attempts to thwart any effort to end the burning, the industry also engages in propaganda pushes. These involve efforts to convince the Glades population and the broader public that its actions are not harmful. For instance, Big Sugar often mentions that the air in the Glades is one of the cleanest in Florida, and that ending burning would decimate the industry and eliminate the over 12,000 jobs it supports. Neither of those claims are rooted in reality. First, the safe air claim was based on Clean Air Act measurements, which averages 24-hour and annual pollution levels. This means that short-term pollution, like cane burning, flies under the radar. Sparse monitoring and malfunctioning monitors aggravate the issue (Ramadan, Ngu, and Miller 2021). Secondly, countries like Brazil are proof that the industry can transition away from burning while preserving jobs and creating new industries. Since burning was outlawed, the sugar industry in Brazil now uses the leaves that used to become smoke to generate renewable energy and sell that electricity at a profit (Sussman 2021). Brazil can serve as an example for Florida as it initiates the conversation about transitioning away from burning. I explore how the state can reproduce Brazil’s lessons below.

Finally, despite the incredible power of Big Sugar, public pressure from increased media attention and local organizing has resulted in limited wins for the Glades. These only came after intense scrutiny and public pressure. For instance, in 2019, the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, responsible for the Florida Forest Service (FFS), the agency that authorizes the burns, enacted new regulations (Sussman 2021). Also, according to Patrick Ferguson from the Sierra Club’s Stop the Burn Campaign, the number of burn permits issued in the region decreased by about 50 percent in the last decade, while the number of acres burned decreased by about 28 percent, as seen in the table below.

Year	Permits Issued by FFS	Acres Burned
2015	6,000	417,000
2024	3,000	300,000

Source: Patrick Ferguson, Senior Organizing Representative, Stop the Burn Campaign

Although these represent modest decreases, most of the problems associated with the burns remain. Specialists from the Sierra Club, University of Florida, and Friends of the Everglades as well as community members all agreed that a complete end to the burning is necessary to put a permanent end to its harmful health effects.

Policy Analysis

A Fair Shake for the People of the Glades

The Glades are one of the most impoverished and socially vulnerable regions in Florida. In Belle Glade, one of the region’s main towns, about 86 percent of the population identifies as people of color, and about a quarter live below the poverty line (Cole 2025; Census Bureau 2024). In the past, the region was so wrecked by poverty, hopelessness, and AIDS that aspiring foreign service officers were sent there to acclimate to the developing world (Ramadan, Ngu, and Miller 2021). The people of the ever-expanding, wealthier, and mostly white suburbs of Palm Beach County, however, get a differentiated treatment when it comes to sugarcane burning. In the early 1990s, as suburbs like Royal Palm Beach expanded westward and closer to the cane fields, resident complaints about air quality flooded the Department of Agriculture. But instead of banning burning outright, the department decided to prohibit burns only when winds are blowing toward said suburbs (Cole 2025).

The Department of Agriculture’s decision created an obvious environmental justice issue. It did so by worsening the disparities between poorer and wealthier communities. Since the 1990s, the people of the communities that border the farms have been forced to bear the full burden of the black smoke while suburbanites avoid the dangerous soot and ash that are synonymous with the burns. The results are clear. Research indicates that residents of the Glades were 10 times more likely to prematurely die from exposure to the black snow than residents of suburbs like Royal Palm Beach (Nowell et al. 2022). Neither of those communities deserves exposure to the dangerous levels of particulate matter that originate from the burns. And they both should possess the services and amenities that will allow their communities to grow and thrive. Unfortunately, the difference in air quality levels contributes to the inequality in educational and socioeconomic outcomes between the Glades and the Palm Beach suburbs. It is past time that the people of the Glades receive their fair shake so they can also achieve their fullest potential.

An Industry at Risk

Although burning might seem like the most economically viable way to clean out sugarcane, the practice is also causing irreparable harm to the fields that Big Sugar relies on to profit. If sugar companies want to continue to harvest the fields for decades to come, a transition to green harvesting must happen soon to avoid rapid land subsidence. According to Andrew Wood, a specialist in green harvesting, agriculture in the Everglades Agricultural Area has a limited future because of the continued destruction of soils due to burning. When burning is used, little organic matter returns to the soil, and growing cane becomes more difficult. This is an issue that can be avoided by green harvesting, since mechanical harvesters cover the soil with the outer leaves, which can be used as mulch, thus preserving the land and making farming sustainable in the long term (Hagens Berman 2020). Other specialists interviewed for this article, such as Mitchell Latzman, science policy analyst at Friends of the Everglades, echoed similar concerns.

The industry faces an existential threat if it continues to refuse to transition to green harvesting. The practice harms not only the people of the Glades but also the land that companies rely on to grow cane every year. Burning only brings about short-term economic savings while causing massive costs to both the people and the companies themselves. After all, if the land is no longer arable, sugar companies will lose their only source of revenue and cause disruptions to the US food supply. If Big Sugar goes out of business, it will also take with it the over 12,000 jobs it supports and massively upend the economic base of the Glades region and of the state. These are all outcomes everyone would like to avoid. It is time to reassess the industry’s reliance on burning and transition to green harvesting to secure a truly sustainable, successful future for all involved.

Policy Proposal

As demonstrated above, there is great unwillingness by both the state and federal government to adjust existing policies to serve the needs of the people of the Glades. In reality, Florida’s state government often seems more willing to appease the wants of the Big Sugar lobby rather than to protect the communities of the Glades. Given this unwillingness of state actors to act, a local, worker-led, and worker-centric solution to stop sugarcane burning and pressure sugar companies to transition to green harvesting is necessary. But first, I examine other potential solutions to the issue.

Ideally, the sugarcane burning issue could be solved in relatively simple ways. Several regulatory avenues could compel sugar companies to transition without much cost to the state or federal government. The Florida Forest Service (FFS), the state agency that authorizes burns, for example, could simply deny all future burn permits, thus forcing companies to widely adopt green harvesting. FFS is under the purview of the Florida Commissioner of Agriculture, an elected official who has the power to issue such a directive. In fact, former Democratic Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, who served from 2019 until 2023, promised change to Glades residents in her electoral campaign. She described herself as committed to “new approaches” and promised “historical change.” But instead of banning or scrutinizing the burning, Fried’s PAC accepted donations from sugar and published a slew of nonbinding rules that are best described as a “nothing burger” (Barton and Morse 2022). While Fried failed to take any meaningful action on the issue, a truly committed AG commissioner could significantly curtail burning and implement gradual change. Another avenue to end the burning could be to condition federal sugar subsidies on the use of green harvesting. As mentioned above, federal tax dollars heavily subsidize the production of sugar in the Glades. By tying federal subsidies to green harvesting, Congress could use its power to ensure that taxpayer dollars are not funding a harmful environmental and socioeconomic practice. This can be done by adding a provision during the Farm Bill reauthorization process.

Fair Food Program

Unfortunately, the simple yet effective solutions mentioned above face slim chances of implementation. Thus, a new approach is necessary to secure a burn-free future for the Glades. A Fair Sugar program, modeled after existing Fair Trade programs, could be a solution that does not require legislative action at the state or federal levels, thus improving its chances of success. The primary goal of a Fair Trade program in the Glades would be to ensure that all farms in the region utilize green harvesting as a means of removing stalks, rather than burning. By implementing strict review processes by an outside organization, customers would be assured that any EAA-grown sugar package with a “Fair Food” stamp was produced without the use of burning as a pre-harvesting technique. This framework recognizes that the government is sometimes unable or unwilling to act on certain issues, so it shifts the burden of changemaking solely from the public sector to a coalition of stakeholders, including consumers, producers, certifiers, and others. Certain government sectors can and should play a role in this process, but they do not act as the sole agent of change.

The success of such a program lies in public pressure and awareness of the burning problem in the Glades. If consumers do not know about the issue, they won’t feel inclined to buy Fair Sugar packages. Public pressure will also play a role in persuading major sugar buyers to buy sugar produced under the program. These include food and beverage manufacturers, fast food chains, grocers, etc. Wide adoption is crucial since it will crowd out producers who refuse to implement green harvesting, forcing them to transition or go out of business. Although this might seem like a gargantuan task, there are successful examples of change under this framework. The Coalition of Omokolee Workers, for instance, secured important workplace improvements by convincing major tomato buyers to pay an extra penny per pound under their Fair Food program. Participating growers have exclusive access to major tomato buyers such as McDonald’s, Walmart, etc., while workers are paid livable wages and are guaranteed humane working conditions (Fair Food Standards Council n.d.). The objectives of the Coalition for Immokalee Workers are different, but the same framework can be used to eradicate burning in the Glades.

Implementation

There are several ways that such a program could be implemented. Ideally, a coalition of farmworkers, local government, and businesses should be involved in the decision-making process. Local governments, who have expressed their willingness to resolve the issue several times, could kickstart implementation by setting up a Fair Food Office. This office would be responsible for securing buyers for Fair Sugar, raising awareness of the issue, documenting residents’ and farmworkers’ complaints, drafting agreements with growers, facilitating the transition, and ensuring compliance. There needs to be heavy stakeholder involvement to ensure feasibility and transparency in the process. Once again, public pressure and awareness are vital to the success of such an initiative, as it relies on public and private adoption.

In the absence of local government action, farmworkers can organize and demand change in ways similar to what the Coalition for Immokalee Workers did back in the 1990s. To secure their demands, workers engaged in a variety of public-facing activities, including PR campaigns highlighting the issue of modern slavery in the fields, marches, strikes, and boycotts (National Farm Worker Ministry 2018). They also independently established the Fair Food Program, which now oversees and certifies compliance of fair food agreements in farms in 21 states and four countries (Fair Food Standards Council n.d.). Farmworkers in the Glades could apply these pressure techniques to compel growers to come to the table, draft their own fair food agreement banning burning, and contract an organization like the Fair Food Program to independently provide compliance oversight.

Case Study and Results

Brazil provides a successful example of what can go right when sugar growers transition to green harvesting. Although Brazil’s transition was brought about legislatively, everyone won in the transition, including growers, farmworkers, and local residents. When Brazil banned burning, sugar growers started using the trash to power the sugar mill and sell the excess to make electricity at a profit. The move can bring additional revenue to sugar growers while ensuring the air stays clean. Nowadays, Brazil’s sugarcane production is considered by many as the most advanced in the world and is a net positive to the environment (Yates 2017). Specialists also note that while Brazil’s transition involved purchasing heavy machinery, Florida growers would not incur any additional costs since the harvest process is already mechanized and the same machine can be used for both processes (Sussman 2021).

Brazil illustrates that a transition to green harvesting need not be an adversarial process between farmworkers/residents and sugar growers. Instead, both sides can come together to plan and advance a bountiful future for all, one that secures the longevity of the industry and a clean environment for residents. After all, implementing green harvesting is in the interest of both groups. Residents gain a clean environment, and growers can ensure that their land is arable for decades to come while creating new revenue streams.

Conclusion

For far too long, Glades residents have been ignored by state and federal authorities as they advocated for their right to live in an environment free of pollution. Heavy lobbying, propaganda pushes, and economic factors have eliminated any chance at meaningful reform in cane cleaning methods. As a result, Big Sugar continues to burn hundreds of thousands of acres of land every year, causing irreparable harm to human health and to the land itself. To make matters worse, state regulations place the entire burden of the smoke on low-income, rural communities who are unable to fight back due to Florida’s restrictive Right to Farm Act. Community members then find themselves feeling exhausted and helpless as the few avenues for change are severely constricted.

However, they are not powerless in this process. The proposed Fair Sugar program enables community members to take ownership of change by providing an alternative to an exclusively legislative solution to the issue. Under such a scheme, residents, farmworkers, and local governments can kickstart the process of phasing out the use of burning as a pre-harvest cleaning method by encouraging buyers to only buy sugar that was sustainably sourced. In doing so, they create an exclusive market for farms that use green harvesting, thus encouraging other producers to join in and enjoy privileged access to certain markets. The program would also benefit sugar growers, who would be able to use the outer leaves as mulch or to make electricity.

Ultimately, this is one of many proposals presented that can bring an end to the burning and clean air to the EAA. A Glades region where every resident can live free of concerns about the “black smoke” should be the ultimate goal of any plan concerning the sugarcane burning issue. This can be a gradual process but the final goal should be to fully transition all sugarcane growing operations to green harvesting. Only then will residents be able to truly achieve their vision of the good life; one that is green, resilient, and equitable for all.