BATON ROUGE, LA (WAFB) -
Sugar is the number one product that comes out of Louisiana, but is that industry in danger now after the findings of a recent national study?
"Sugar: The Bitter Truth" is Dr. Robert Lustig's presentation that has people all over the country questioning the safety of sugar. The UC San Francisco professor calls the sweet substance "toxic", and claims it's the number one cause of diseases like type ii diabetes and hypertension.
"I guess we're attacked all the time, as any commodity, but especially sugar because it's looked upon as a luxury," said sugar farmer Cecil Ramagos.
Cecil Ramagos has been a sugarcane farmer for the past 30 years. Ramagos says the industry has been attacked about prices in the past, and this recent villianization of sugar is not new, either. The Louisiana Farm Bureau says simply, what happens to sugar after it leaves the fields is out of the farmer's control.
"It relies on food manufacturers, I think, to include what in food products the things that consumers want," said Michael Danna with the Louisiana Farm Bureau. "Farmers are simply there to provide the product."
Danna says the study failed to consider a huge factor in a person's health – heredity. He says while it's unfortunate sugar is taking the heat now, things like corn and carbohydrates have bounced back from bad PR, and he's sure sugar will too.
"I know what we grow, and I know the efforts that we put into to make safe...it's affordable, and it's something that I would trust my family with," said Ramagos.
Ramagos and Danna agree that it's the consumer's responsibility to do their own research to find out what they're putting in their bodies.
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